32 LEAVES FROM AN APRIL JOURNAL. 



blossoms. I am almost surprised to find the deli- 

 cate, blue-eyed Hepatica peeping out from the dead 

 mass of fallen leaves; the slender scape and the 

 fresh new leaves now unfolding are warmly clothed 

 with soft wool-like hairs, as if Nature feared to send 

 them forth these uncertain days without their over- 

 coats. Here, too, are the earliest of the composites ; 

 plantain, everlastings with their woolly leaves and 

 inconspicuous flowers, curling out of the brown. 

 This low cudweed has two kinds of flowers on 

 different individual stems; on one head I find 

 a collection of slender tubular flowers in which 

 the pistils and ovaries are seen, while others bear 

 nothing but stamens. Food for the smaller honey- 

 gatherers is scarce, and so this lowly plant has blos- 

 somed early before the gaudy ones have appeared, 

 to attract them to its cups, and thus carry the 

 pollen from one kind to the other. 



It is remarkable to what a degree the pond in 

 Spenser's Meadow swarms with different living 

 creatures ! The warm rays of the sun have brought 

 into being, as if by magic, myriads of gnats that 

 fringe the shore. One can watch through a glass 

 with deep interest the process of shuffling off their 

 mortal coils and taking wings to sport above the 

 water. Here among the species of green confer- 



