.

Here the robin redbreast's nesting,
Here, from golden dawn till night,
Honey bees are gaily swimming
In a sea of pink and white.

Just a sea of fragrant blossoms,
Steeped in sunshine, drenched in dew,
Just a fragrant breath which tells you
Earth is fair again and new.

Just a breath of subtle sweetness,
Breath which holds the spice o' youth,
Holds the promise o' the summer--
Holds the best o' things, forsooth.

There's no garden like an orchard,
Nature shows no fairer thing
Than the apple trees in blossom
In these late days o' the spring.

JEAN BLEWETT

INSPIRED BY THE SNOW

The black squirrel delights in the new-fallen snow like a boy--a real
boy, with red hands as well as red cheeks, and an automatic mechanism of
bones and muscles capable of all things except rest. The first snow
sends a thrill of joy through every fibre of such a boy, and a thousand
delights crowd into his mind. The gliding, falling coasters on the
hills, the passing sleighs with niches on the runners for his feet, the
flying snowballs, the sliding-places, the broad, tempting ice, all whirl
through his mind in a delightful panorama, and he hurries out to catch
the elusive flakes in his outstretched hands and to shout aloud in the
gladness of his heart. And the black squirrel becomes a boy with the
first snow. What a pity he cannot shout! There is a superabundant joy
and life in his long, graceful bounds, when his beautiful form, in its
striking contrast with the white snow, seems magnified to twice its real
size. Perhaps there is vanity as well as joy in his lithe, bounding
motions among the naked trees, for nature seems to have done her utmost
to provide a setting that would best display his graces of form and
motion.

When the falling snow clings in light, airy masses on the spruces and
pines, and festoons the naked tracery and clustering winter buds of the
maples--when the still air seems to fix every twig and branch and
clinging mass of snow in a solid medium of crystal, the spell of
stillness is broken by the silent but joyful leaps of the hurrying
squirrel. How alive he seems, in contrast with the silence of the snow,
as his outlines contrast with its perfect white! His body curves and
elongates with regular undulations, as he measures off the snow with
twin footprints. Away in the distance he is still visible among the
naked trunks, a mov