soil feels it, and inhales the incense of gratitude; that cloud, so different from the clouds of winter, so soft and wreathy, and like the dew-filled fleece of Gideon, comes spring-loaded from the great Giver-one of the wishes of nature fulfilled. Only stand still, and listen; all is silent, the silence of hope, of assured expectation. The very birds, for the moment, are hushed; but it is only the hush of pleasing suspense; let the signal be given, and out they will burst into a glorious chorus. Did you note that slight rustle among the branches? was it not soft as the folding of angelwings? It was nature breathing over her beauties. But I need not tax imagination in order to see the spring. Already its outward and visible signs are every where around me. Yesterday morning, on visiting my garden, I descried that welcome messenger of spring, the galanthus nivalis, or snowdrop. There it lay "beneath its white coverlid, so pure and pale, so true an emblem of hope, and trust, and confidence, that it might teach a lesson to the desponding, and show the useless and inactive how invaluable are the stirrings of that energy that can work out its purpose in secret, and under oppression, and be ready in the fulness of time to make that purpose manifest and complete." A little further on, a group of hepaticas smiled to receive me; the fringed star of Bethlehem and the spring bulbocodium were trembling with delight-a crocus was looking like a whole spring in itself-a primrose spoke to the imagination of thatched cottages, and sloping banks, and woody dells, and happy children—and a violet, without holding up its head, spoke to the heart of modest retiring beauty, and the fragrance of virtue. Going forth again, in the open weather of the evening, I was greeted with other harbingers of spring-less lovely to the eye, indeed, than those which I have named, but far from unacceptable to the lover of nature-the grey slug, and the homely earthworm, and the bat, just awoke from its winter's sleep. Before I left home this morning for my walk, a redbreast, which I have fed through the cold weather, came to my window, sang as merrily as a robin canthanked me for all past favours-and said, as plainly as he could, that he was about to look out for a "better half." A tomtit and chaffinch were by and heard him, and signified that so good an example deserved to be followed. As to the sparrows, they have all paired, and are furnishing their houses. But what large bird is that winging its way on high, as if from the sea-coast? surely it is the curlew; then he is retiring from his winter haunt to his inland breedingplace. And, hark! the lyric sky-lark is aloft at heaven's gates, raining down a shower of music to the earth; and there bursts forth the song-thrush, singing as if he would never grow old," and as if the six pure scarlet drops in his body were elixir vita; and there darts by a bee, humming as merrily as if all the world were a hive, or every thing in it flowers and honey. 66 Man of the city! dost thou not almost wish for a country calenture, that thou mightest taste the spring, if only by the force of a diseased imagination? Wilt thou not treat thy poor wheezing lungs with a little country air? Dost thou not long for "the key of the field?" Wouldst thou not give thy freedom of the city to be made free of the green paths,— "The haunts of deer, And sheep-walks populous with bleating lambs; Peeps through the moss that clothes the hawthorn root ?” Will thy street-music compare with that music of the flock or thy dancing dogs with the joyous gambols of those new-yeaned lambs ? Hear what Milton saith on the subject: "In those vernal seasons of the year, when the air is calm and pleasant, it were an injury and sullenness against nature not to go out and see her riches, and partake in her rejoicing with heaven and earth." Dost thou not feel inclined to go forth at once? Is not the spring strong upon thee, and the sun shining in upon thy heart? Lift up thy voice, then, and sing of "the coming spring :" "Hail, bounteous spring, thou dost inspire Mirth, and youth, and warm desire; THE LEAF. We all do fade as a leaf.-ISAIAH. HAVE you never been struck, reader, by the evident resemblance between the various appearances of nature, and the various states of the human mind, as well as the successive stages of human life? If not, reflect on it, and you will find it interesting. We can easily conceive how the Divine Being might have created a perpetual variance between our condition and the state of nature around us. When he pronounced the earth accursed" for our sakes," he might have aggravated that curse, by surrounding us to a painful extent with immitigable sameness. He might have reduced the large variety of animal tribes to the few which we use for food; and have left us no quadruped to please us with its gambols-no insect to sport in the summer's sun-no birds to delight us with their flight and their song. He might have taken away all the beauty of the landscape, by commanding the hill to sink and the valley to rise to a perfect level-by sinking the torrent and the rivulet beneath the surface of the earth-and by substituting for the towering and luxuriant tree nothing but the thorn and the brier. And from this scene he might have commanded the moon and the stars to withdraw their light, and have permitted the sun to look upon it only through a cloud. And had the face of nature worn an aspect so dreary, he doubtless would have counted himself most happy, or rather least miserable, who could have secluded himself most effectually from beholding it. But so far from being surrounded by such a scene, paradise was not more adapted to man in his state of primeval purity, than the present condition of nature corresponds with our altered circumstances. We know not to what extent the fall of man affected the original constitution of nature. In the poetic eye of Milton, "Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops Wept at completing of the mortal sin Original." But this, if more than poetically correct, was only a presage of approaching revolution. From the tenour of the curse, we learn that a material change, never to be revoked, immediately followed. Nor do we know the effects produced by the universal deluge, and by other convulsions of nature. But whatever they may have been, we find ourselves the passing inhabitants of a world where nature, animate and inanimate, seems to sympathize with out lot, to point out our duties, and to remind us of our end. Nature, in this light, is only a grand depository of means intended to promote the end of our being. It is a temple in which piety finds herself surrounded by a thousand emanations from the Supreme, and addressed by a thousand voices of warning and encouragement. The poet has drawn from it his most pathetic images-the moralist many of his best arguments and examples—and the prophet some of his most arousing monitions. In exemplification of this fact, but without pretending to furnish an adequate idea of it, you may be reminded of a few of the more obvious illustrations of our condition with which nature abounds. How often is the restlessness of man compared to the constant agitation of the ocean; and the uncertainty of friendship, and of success in life, to the instability of that element. How beautifully does the setting of the unclouded sun illustrate the closing scene of the Christian's life; how friendly the calm and twilight of evening are to solitude and meditation; and how aptly the rage of a storm represents the frequent turbulence |