. There was
all the water on the lowlands to drink up; all the little green buds
just coming out on the trees to warm; the bees to waken up and send
honey-seeking amongst the crocuses, primroses, and violets, that were
all peeping out from amongst last autumn's dead leaves; flies to hunt
out of crevices where they had been asleep all the winter; and old
Bluejacket, the watchman beetle, to wake up from his long doze; as well
as Nibblenut the squirrel, Spikey the hedgehog, and ever so many more
old friends and neighbours; and so, of course, he was not going to be
put down by a cold, raw mist. And, "Pooh!" he said, looking sideways at
it, and, as he got his face a little higher, right through it, "Pooh!
that won't do; you've been up all night, so be off to bed, and don't
think that I am going to put up with any of your nonsense. You had it
all your own way whilst I was busy down south; but I've come back now to
set things right; so off you go."

Whereupon the mist looked as raw and cross as he could, but it was of no
use; so he rolled himself off the lawn, down the hollow, and into the
vale, where he hung about over the river ever so long, evidently meaning
to come back again; but the sun was after him in a twinkling, and so
there was nothing else for it, and the poor mist crept into a cave by
the river's bank, and went to sleep all day.

"Hooray!" said the birds when the mist was gone; and all the little
pearly dew-drops were sparkling and twinkling on the grass. The daisy
opened his eye and sat watching the grass grow; while the bees--as their
grand friends, the great flowers, had not yet come to town--came buzzing
about, and carried the news from daisy to daisy that Queen Spring was
coming, and that there were to be grander doings than ever in the
garden. "Hooray!" said the birds, for they knew it too, and they all
set to work, singing in the gladness of their hearts to think that old
Niptoes the winter had gone at last, and that there would be plenty to
eat, and no more going about with feathers sticking up, and no leaves to
shelter anybody by night.

A fine place was Greenlawn, for there the birds had it all their own
way; not a nest was touched; not a gun was ever seen; and as to powder,
the rooks up in the lime-trees never smelt it in their lives; but built
their great awkward nests, and punched the lawn about till the grubs
used to hold consultations together, and at last determined to emigrate,
but as no o