“ All in ye Merrie Month of May ” 
THE ANGEL OF THE RAIN! 
Who comes ? With a sound of rushing wings, 
Of waterspouts across the arid plain, 
Of waterfalls and wakening springs, 
The Angel of the Rain ! 
With silver feet across the darkening sky, 
And all the clouds of heaven in his train, 
Girt with the Rainbow — veiled to mortal eye, 
The Angel of the Rain ! 
A Breath unto the thirsty ground, 
Afar, abroad, earth growing pure again, 
Obeying storm winds circling him around, 
The Angel of the Rain ! 
May 2. — The rain has brought out all the wonderful 
pervading scent of the sweetbriar bushes just beginning 
to be in leaf; it is delicious to walk in the lane to-day, 
Sweetbriar Lane is said to be haunted. Down in the hollow 
by the tall firs, where there used to be a ford, but where 
now the burn is bridged, I am told a phantom dog wanders. 
Did he lose a beloved master there in some winter spate ? 
I do not know, and I cannot even find out what manner of a 
Dog he was, but I should fancy a Collie with fluffy feathery tail 
and clever canny face, like old Toss at the farmsteading ; 
collies are so ’cute and attached to their masters. They 
are very difficult to get, as shepherds never like to sell 
collie pups for pets, but only for shepherds’ work. In the 
Highlands they go to church with their masters, but 
apparently that is not the custom here. Toss is not a dog 
who gives his friendship to all comers, or indeed quickly 
to any ; he is a true canny Scot. We hunted in the beech 
hedge to-day for nests ; it was still brown with its winter’s 
leaves. We only found last year’s empty bird-homes, some 
so ramshackle and tumble-to-pieces, just like cheap unlet 
tenement houses. The squirrels are very busy in the 
“ plantin ” ripping off the chestnut-buds. They are so 
tame they will sit still in the grass as we pass, or scurry a 
few feet up the bole of a beech, and peep at us round the 
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