SPRING BEAUTY. 
85 
The scape springs from a small deep tuber, bearing a single pair 
of soft, oily, succulent leaves. In the white flowered species, these 
leaves are placed about midway up the stem, but in the pink ((7. 
Virginica) the leaves lie closer to the ground, and are smaller and 
of a dark bluish green hue. Our Spring Beauty well deserves its 
pretty poetical name. It comes in with the Robin, and the song 
sparrow, the hepatica, and the first white violet; it lingers in shady 
spots, as if unwilling to desert us till more sunny days have wakened 
up a wealth of brighter blossoms to gladden the eye; yet the first, 
and the last, are apt to be most prized by us, with flowers, as well 
as other treasures. 
How infinitely wise and merciful are the arrangements of the 
Great Creator. Let us instance the connection between Bees and 
Flowers. In cold climates the former lie torpid, or nearly so 
during the long months of Winter, until the genial rays of the sun 
and light have quickened vegetation into activity, and buds and 
blossoms open, containing the nutriment necessary for this busy 
insect tribe. 
The Bees seem made for the Blossoms; the Blossoms for the 
Bees. 
On a bright March morning what sound can be more in harmony 
with the sunshine and blue skies, than the murmuring of the honey¬ 
bees, in a border of cloth of gold crocuses ? what sight more cheerful 
to the eye ? But I forget. Canada has few of these sunny flowers, 
and no March days like those that woo the hive bees from their 
winter dormitories. And April is with us only a name. We have 
no April month of rainbow suns and showers. We miss the deep 
blue skies, and silver throne-like clouds that cast their fleeting 
w 
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