296 EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 
instincts to these localities, while the earth has 
still but a wintry aspect, so far as vegetation is 
concerned, buzz around some obscure spathe 
close to the ground, well knowing what they are 
about, then alight and enter. As the plants 
were very numerous for thirty or forty rods, 
they must have been some hundreds, at least, of 
bees there at once. I watched many when they 
entered and came out, and they all had little 
yellow pellets of pollen at their thighs. As the 
skunk-cabbage comes out before the willow, it 
is probable that the former is the first flower 
they visit. It is the more surprising, as the 
flower is, for the most part, invisible within the 
spathe. Some of these spathes are now quite 
large and twisted up like cows’ horns, not 
curved over, as usual. Commonly they make 
a pretty little crypt or shrine for the flower. 
Lucky that this flower does not flavor their 
honey. 
One cowslip, though it shows the yellow, is 
not fairly out, but will be by to-morrow. How 
they improve their time. Not a moment of 
sunshine is lost. One thing I may depend on, 
there has been no idling with the flowers. Na¬ 
ture loses not a moment, takes no vacation. 
They advance as steadily as a clock. These 
plants, now protected by the water, are just 
peeping forth. I should not be surprised to find 
that they drew in their heads in a frosty night. 
