THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
49 
pillars of light at right and left, below and overhead had 
accompanied the sun all day. 
Though the buttercup is without doubt entitled to the 
honor of being called our earliest spring flower, here again 
a low member of the parsley family is a close second. It 
clings to the cliffs ot crumbling basalt among the mosses 
and selaginellas. It blossoms soon after the first butter* 
cups, and is followed closely by a small fritillary (Fntil- 
laria pudica), the yellow dog's-tooth violet (Ervthronium 
grand if]o rum), and the bluebells (Mertensia oblongi folia). 
We love instinctivel3^ the first flowers of spring. There 
is something in the first frail blossoms ol the opening year 
which seems to touch somewhere deep down in the human 
heart an element of universal sympathy. The toiling 
farmer, the hurrying man of business, and the rough miner 
far away in the solitude of the hills will often pause and 
pluck the first spring blossom to gaze upon it for a 
moment in silent thought. Is it simply because they tell 
us that the cold and snow of winter are past and that 
spring has come again, or is there in them a far deeper 
meaning, a symbolism dimly grasped by every mind and 
shadowed forth in the literature of every land and tongue ? 
As we see them spring in beautj^, fresh with renewed 
life and vigor, from the dead, cold earth of winter, is there 
not an unseen psychologic process which unconsciously 
associates them with those hallowed sentiments which 
gather round our Eastertide — the expectation of a resur- 
rection and the hope of immortality. 
Kooskia, Idaho. 
STIRRINGS OF LIFE. 
BY DR. WILLIAM WHITMAN BAILEY. 
IF one were to put his ear to the ground at this season, 
like Fine-Ear in the fairy tale, he might, perchance, 
hear much commotion in the subterranean laboratories. 
A thousand tiny mechanics are preparing for the spring 
campaign. Night and day do they labor on their invisible 
anvils, welding armor for the fray. 
