Earliest Signs of Spring 



Nature never displayed a more unobtrusive 

 yet profound contrast of the transient and eter- 

 nal in plant-life, than in placing side by side, 

 on trees and rocks, in all the woods and fields, 

 this brilliant and ephemeral moss — a hectic flush 

 upon a dying root — and the scarious, passion- 

 less lichen, cadaverous, yet having in itself al- 

 most the strength of endless life — a life, as one 

 naturalist expresses it, "which bears in itself no 

 cause of death, and is only to be ended by exter- 

 nal injuries, or by the alteration of climatic and 

 atmospheric conditions. ' ' Whoever recognizes 

 this nature of the lichen beneath its humble, 

 frigid exterior, must feel a genuine and peculiar 

 respect for it, as the very tissue of heroism, the 

 type of grim and inexhaustible tenacity of pur- 

 pose. Deriving its nutriment from the moisture 

 and floating particles of mineral substance in the 

 atmosphere, it can withstand almost the severest 

 changes of climate, and is nearly impervious to 

 the extremes of cold and heat, of flood and 

 drought. It has an unparalleled capacity for 

 dormancy ; and, when its surroundings are so 

 insufferable as absolutely to prevent its further 

 development, it simply goes to sleep, and waits 

 for better times to come. Profoundly philosoph- 

 ical ! It is correspondingly slow in coming to 

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