A SPRING RELISH 



encouragingly, I could not tell. Occasion- 

 ally he would take a hand, but whether to 

 separate them or whether to fan the flames, 

 that I could not tell. So far as I could see, 

 he was highly amused, and culpably indif- 

 ferent to the issue of the battle. 



The English spring begins much earlier 

 than ours in New England and New York, 

 yet an exceptionally early April with us 

 must be nearly, if not quite, abreast with 

 April as it usually appears in England. 

 The blackthorn sometimes blooms in Brit- 

 ain in February, but the swallow does not 

 appear till about the 20th of April, nor the 

 anemone bloom ordinarily till that date. 

 The nightingale comes about the same time, 

 and the cuckoo follows close. Our cuckoo 

 does not come till near June ; but the water- 

 thrush, which Audubon thought nearly 

 equal to the nightingale as a songster 

 (though it certainly is not), I have known to 

 come by the 21st. I have seen the sweet 

 English violet, escaped from the garden, 

 and growing wild by the roadside, in bloom 

 on the 25th of March, which is about its 

 date of flowering at home. During the 

 same season, the first of our native flowers 

 to appear was the hepatica, which I found 

 49 



