154 EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 
rioiis newly-created island of the spring, just 
sprung up from the bottom in the midst of the 
blue waters. The fawn-colored oak leaves, with 
a few pines intermixed, thickly covering the 
hill, look not like a withered vegetation, but 
an ethereal kind just expanded and peculiarly 
adapted to the season and the sky. 
Look toward the sun, the water is yellow, as 
water in which the earth had just washed itself 
clean of its winter impurities ; look from the 
sun and it is a beautiful dark-blue, but in each 
direction the crests of the waves are white, and 
you cannot sail or row over this watery wilder¬ 
ness without sharing the excitement of this ele¬ 
ment. Our sail draws so strongly that we cut 
through the great waves without feeling them. 
. ... We meet one great gull beating up the 
course of the river against the wind at Flint’s 
Bridge. It is a very leisurely sort of limping 
flight, the bird tacking its way along like a sail¬ 
ing vessel. Yet the slow security with which 
it advances suggests a leisurely contemplative¬ 
ness, as if it were working out some problem 
quite at its leisure. As often as its very nar¬ 
row, long, and curved wings are lifted up 
against the light, I see a very narrow, distinct 
light edging to the wing where it is thin. Its 
black tipt wings. Afterwards from Ball’s Hill 
I see two more circling about looking for food 
over the ice and water. 
