The Project Gutenberg eBook, Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April,
1861, by Various

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Title: Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861

Author: Various

Release Date: February 18, 2004 [eBook #11155]

Language: English

Character set encoding: US-ASCII

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 7, ISSUE
42, APRIL, 1861***

E-text prepared by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen, and Project Gutenberg
Distributed Proofreaders

THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.

A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS.

VOL. VII.--APRIL, 1861.--NO. XLII.

APRIL DAYS.

"Can trouble dwell with April days?"

_In Memoriam._

In our methodical New England life, we still recognize some magic in
summer. Most persons reluctantly resign themselves to being decently
happy in June, at least. They accept June. They compliment its weather.
They complained of the earlier months as cold, and so spent them in
the city; and they will complain of the later months as hot, and so
refrigerate themselves on some barren sea-coast. God offers us yearly a
necklace of twelve pearls; most men choose the fairest, label it June,
and cast the rest away. It is time to chant a hymn of more liberal
gratitude.

There are no days in the whole round year more delicious than those
which often come to us in the latter half of April. On these days one
goes forth in the morning, and an Italian warmth broods over all the
hills, taking visible shape in a glistening mist of silvered azure, with
which mingles the smoke from many bonfires. The sun trembles in his
own soft rays, till one understands the old English tradition, that he
dances on Easter-Day. Swimming in a sea of glory, the tops of the hills
look nearer than their bases, and their glistening watercourses seem
close to the eye, as is their liberated murmur to the ear. All across
this broad interval the teams are ploughing. The grass in the meadow
seems all to have grown green since yesterday. The blackbirds jangle
in the oak, the robin is perched upon the elm, the song-sparrow on the
hazel, and the bluebird on the apple-tree. There rises a hawk and sails
slowly, the stateliest of airy things, a f