FEBRUARY. 31 



delightful days, will always crowd most sweetly and 

 vividly upon my recollection. 



After a long confinement within doors, our feelings 

 are keenly alive to agreeable impressions from rural 

 sights and sounds, which are associated with the pleas- 

 ures of the past summer. Then does the sight of a 

 green arbor in the woods, or a green plat in the valley, 

 affect one as I can imagine the weary traveller in the 

 desert is affected, upon meeting an oasis, in the midst of 

 the drifting sands. The melancholy that attends a ram- 

 ble in the autumn has passed from us, and we now 

 come forth, during the sleep of vegetation, and in the 

 general hush of animated things, with feelings allied to 

 the cheerfulness that inspires the mind, when the little 

 song-sparrow pours out his early lays of gladness to the 

 first bright morning in spring. Some blessing comes 

 from every sacrifice, and some recompense for every 

 privation. Thus does the darkness of night prepare us 

 to welcome with gladness the dawn of a new morning. 

 The charm of life proceeds from these vicissitudes, and 

 we are capable of no new enjoyment until we have 

 rested from pleasure. 



I have often taken advantage of one of these serene 

 days of winter, to ramble in the woods. Every sound I 

 hear at such a time is music, though it be but the cow- 

 bell's chime, the stroke of the woodman's axe, or the crash 

 of some tall tree, just falling to the ground. Sometimes 

 during this season of calm sunshine, the little squirrels 

 will come forth from their retreats; and in the echoing 

 silence of the woods, we may hear their rustling leap 

 among the dry oak leaves, their occasional chirrup, and 

 the dropping of nutshells from the lofty branches of the 

 hickory. There is music in all the echoes that break 

 the stillness of the scenes around ; in the cawing of the 



