EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 241 
They swoop from side to side in the broad basin 
of the tree-tops, with wider and wider surges, 
as if swung by an invisible pendulum. They 
stoop down on this side and scale up on that. 
Suddenly I look up and see a new bird, prob¬ 
ably an eagle, quite above me, laboring with 
the wind not more than forty rods off. It was 
the largest bird of the falcon kind I ever saw. 
I was never so impressed by any flight. She 
sailed the air, and fell back from time to time 
like a ship on her beam-ends, holding her talons 
up as if ready for the arrows. I never allowed 
before for the grotesque attitude of our national 
bird. The eagle must have an educated eye. 
See what a life the gods have given us, set 
round with pain and pleasure. It is too strange 
for sorrow, it is too strange for joy. One while 
it looks as shallow, though as intricate as a Cre¬ 
tan labyrinth, and again it is a pathless depth. 
I ask for bread incessantly, that my life sustain 
me as much as meat my body. No man know- 
eth in what hour his life may come. Say not 
that nature is trivial, for to-morrow she will be 
radiant with beauty. 
March 27, 1853. P. M. To Martial 
Miles’s. .... The hazel is fully out. The 
23d was perhaps full early to date them. It is 
in some respects the most interesting flower 
yet, though so minute that only an observer of 
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