58 OUTDOOR STUDIES 
latter April. There is as yet no evening prim- 
rose to open suddenly, no cistus to drop its 
petals; but the Mayflower knows the moment, 
and becomes more fragrant in the darkness, so 
that one can then often find it in the woods 
without aid from the eye. The pleasant night 
sounds are begun ; the hylas are uttering their 
shrill peep from the meadows, mingled soon 
with hoarser toads, who take to the water at 
this season to deposit their spawn. The tree- 
toads soon join them; but one listens in vain 
for bull-frogs or katydids or grasshoppers or 
whip-poor-wills or crickets: we must wait for 
most of these until the nights of June. 
The earliest familiar token of the coming 
season is the expansion of the stiff catkins of 
the alder into soft, drooping tresses. These 
are so sensitive that, if you pluck them at 
almost any time during the winter, a few days’ 
sunshine will make them open in a vase of 
water, and thus they eagerly yield to every mo- 
ment of April warmth. The blossom of the 
birch is more delicate, that of the willow more 
showy, but the alders come first. They cluster 
and dance everywhere upon the bare boughs 
above the watercourses ; the blackness of the 
buds is softened into rich brown and yellow; 
and as this graceful creature thus comes wav- 
ing into the spring, it is pleasant to remember 
