A Window in Arcady 
May i. —All the excitement of the world this last 
week has by no means been confined to the stock markets. 
Quiet folk, who, having freedom of mind and inclination 
to watch other things than brokers’ blackboards, have had 
their reward in witnessing the trees burst into leaf—an 
event which has been later this season than usual, but 
which, once begun, has been accomplished with startling 
suddenness. 
A few days ago there was scarcely an opened leaf bud on 
a tree in all our countryside. For some reason unknown 
to mortals, April and Old Sol were at loggerheads this 
year. April pouted and cried her best days away, and 
Sol, Achilles-like, sulked in a tent of clouds, and so be¬ 
tween them they managed to hold back the whole leafy 
procession until May was at the very door. 
Then, presto! and the race of the trees for the first full 
suit of the year is on. The thick, gummy scales in which 
the buds snugly spent the winter in security from icy 
blasts crack at last in every tree top and come dropping 
to the earth in chaffy showers. Out of the buds comes a 
variety of things. Here are, first of all, the infant leaves 
which unfold themselves very neatly and grow into big 
leaves with almost the rapidity of Jack’s beanstalk; then 
there comes the new twig growth, which, instead of being 
spread over a whole season as one is apt to think, is usually 
completed in these first few days of real spring; and then 
again, there come the flowers of the tree, for every tree 
bears flowers, though sometimes so modestly that the care¬ 
less world never sees them. We all know the blossoms of 
the fruit trees, and the showy panicles of the horse chest- 
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