EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 179 
meadow described day before yesterday) are 
not repeated the same year, at least not with 
the same force, for the next day the same phe¬ 
nomenon does not surprise us, our appetite has 
lost its edge. The other day the face of the 
meadow wore a peculiar appearance as if it 
were beginning to wake up under the influence 
of the southwest wind and the warm sun, but 
it cannot again this year present precisely that 
appearance to me. I have taken a 'step for¬ 
ward to a new position and must see something 
else. We perceive and are affected by changes 
too subtle to be described. 
I see little swarms of those fine fuzzy gnats 
in the air. It is their wings which are most 
conspicuous when they are in the sun. Their 
bodies are comparatively small and black, and 
they have two mourning plumes on their fronts. 
Are not these the winter gnat? They keep up 
a circulation in the air like water bugs on the 
water. Sometimes there is a globular swarm 
two feet or more in diameter suggesting how 
genial and habitable the air has become. They 
people a portion of the otherwise vacant air, 
being apparently for and of the sunshine, in 
which they are most conspicuous. 
By the river I see distinctly red-wings and 
hear their conqueree . They are not associated 
with grackles. They are an age before their 
