in
buckets and shouting: "Po' ole Moses--po' ole fellah! O-Y-S-T-E-R-S!
O-Y-STERS!" And Bobbins, the gardener, who raked up last year's autumn
leaves and either burned them in piles or spread them on the flower-beds
as winter blankets. And, of course, Mockburn, the night watchman:
nothing ever happens in and around Kennedy Square that Mockburn doesn't
know of. Many a time has he helped various unsteady gentlemen up the
steps of their houses and stowed them carefully and noiselessly away
inside, only to begin his rounds again, stopping at every corner to
drone out his "All's we-l-l!" a welcome cry, no doubt, to the stowaways,
but a totally unnecessary piece of information to the inhabitants,
nothing worse than a tippler's tumble having happened in the forty years
of the old watchman's service.

I, of course, am in the secret of the mysterious happenings and have
been for more years than I care to admit, but then I go ten better than
Mockburn. And so would you be in the secret had you watched the process
as closely as I have done.

It is always the same!

First the crocuses peep out--dozens of crocuses. Then a spread of tulips
makes a crazy-quilt of a flowerbed; next the baby buds, their delicate
green toes tickled by the south wind, break into laughter. Then the
stately magnolias step free of their pods, their satin leaves falling
from their alabaster shoulders--grandes dames these magnolias! And then
there is no stopping it: everything is let loose; blossoms of peach,
cherry, and pear; flowers of syringa--bloom of jasmine, honeysuckle,
and Virginia creeper; bridal wreath in flowers of white and wistaria in
festoons of purple.

Then come the roses--millions of roses; on single stalks; in clusters,
in mobs; rushing over summer-houses, scaling fences, swarming up
trellises--a riotous, unruly, irresistible, and altogether lovable lot
these roses when they break loose!

And the birds! What a time they are having--thrush, bobolinks,
blackbirds, nightingales, woodpeckers, little pee-wees, all fluttering,
skimming, chirping; bursting their tiny throats for the very joy of
living. And they are all welcome--and it wouldn't make any difference to
them if they hadn't been; they would have risked it anyway, so tempting
are the shady paths and tangled arbors and wide-spreading elms and
butternuts of Kennedy Square.

Soon the skies get over weeping for the lost winter and dry their eyes,
and the big, warm, happy sun sails over