We have gathered our "handful of daisies" but are we satisfied? No, so full are these early spring meadows already of fresh grass and budding flowers, breathing out their delicate vernal odours, that our hearts yearn after farther wanderings among the fields of nature and of poetry, and whilst the fleecy clouds are careering above our heads, and the cawing of noisy rooks is in our ears, and our feet are buried in fresh herbage, and the whole year begins to "grow lush in juicy stalks," let us listen a little longer how the poets have gathered sweet fancies and quaint teachings from these gentle ever-recurring objects in long past years as well as yesterday.

And first let us have the words of a young poet, a true worshipper in the Temple of Nature:

PRIMROSES.

Within a wood, no farther from the sea
Than you might hear the waves dash audibly,
There flowers grew; the high hills closing round,
Made of the little dell a fairy ground

For warmth and greenness; never winter dare
Invade the softness of its tranquil air.

Adown the wood a lucent stream doth brawl,
And earliest here the welcome cuckoo's call;
In the far-distant white-sailed vessels ride.
Or tiny fleets of fishers deck the tide.
My picture is too faint, but it may bring
Some image to you of the scenes I sing.

BESSIE PARKES.

Here still are old Herrick's

PRIMROSES FILLED WITH MORNING DEW.

Why doe ye weep, sweet babes? Can tears

Speak griefe in you,

Who were but borne

Just as the modest morne

Teem'd her refreshing dew?
Alas you have not known that shower
That marres a flower;

Nor felt th' unkind

Breath of a blasting wind;

Nor are ye worne with yeares;

Or wrapt, as we,

Who think it strange to see

Such pretty flowers (like to orphans young),
To speak by teares before they have a tongue.

Speak, whimp'ring younglings; and make known
The reason why

Ye droop, and weep.

Is it for want of sleep;
Or childish lullabie?

Or, that ye have not seen as yet
The violet?

Or brought a kisse

From that sweetheart to this
No, no; this sorrow, shown
By your teares shed,

Wo'd have this lecture read,

"That things of greatest, so of meanest worth,

Conceiv'd with grief are, and with teares brought forth."

Here in this old croft, nodding to the breeze, are again flowers from Herrick :

And who does not recal with joy Wordsworth's poem to the same beautiful objects ?—

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vale and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host of golden Daffodils.
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle in the milky way,
They stretch in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay;
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay

În such a jocund company;

I gazed-and gazed-but little thought
What wealth to me the show had brought.

For oft when on my couch I lie,
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude.
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

And now, as Miss Mitford on this occasion prefers to be alone, ere we return home let us invisibly accompany her

A-VIOLETING.

"March 27th.-It is a dull grey morning, with a dewy feeling in the air; fresh, but not windy; cool, but not cold; the very day for a person newly arrived from the heat, the glare, the noise, and the fever of London, to plunge into the remotest labyrinths of the country, and regain the repose of mind, the calmness of heart, which has been lost in that great battle. I must go violeting-it is a necessity -and I must go alone.

*

The common that I am now passing the Lea, as it is called-is one of the loveliest spots near my house.

It is a little sheltered scene, retiring, as it were, from the village; sunk amidst higher lands-hills would be almost too grand a word-edged on one side by our gay high-road, and intersected by another; and surrounded by a most picturesque confusion of meadows, cottages, farms, and orchards; and with a great pond in one corner, unusually bright and clear, giving a delighful cheerfulness and day-light to the picture. The swallows haunt that pond; so do the children. There is a merry group round it now; I have seldom seen it without one. Children love water, clear, bright, sparkling water; it excites and feeds their curiosity; it is motion and life.

A turn in the lane, and we come to the old house standing amongst the high elms,-the old farm house, which always, I don't know why, carries back my imagination to Shakespeare's days. It is a long low, irregular building, with one room at an angle from the house, covered with ivy, fine, white-veined ivy; the first floor of the main building projecting, and supported by oaken beams, and one of the windows below with its old casement and long narrow frames, forming the half of a shallow hexagon. A porch, with seats in it, surrounded by a pinnacle, pointed roofs and clustered chimneys, complete the picture! The very walls are crumbling to decay under a careless landlord and a ruined tenant.

Now a few yards farther and I reach the bank. Ah! I smell them already, most exquisite perfume steams and lingers in this moist heavy air. Through this little gate, and along the green south bank of this green wheat-field, and they burst upon me, the lovely violets, in tenfold loveliness. The ground is covered with them, white and purple, enamelling the short dewy grass, looking but the more vividly coloured under the dull, leaden sky. There they lie by hundreds, by thousands. In former years I have been used to watch them from the tiny green bud, till one or two stole into bloom. They never came on me before in such a sudden and luxuriant glory of simple beauty -and I do really owe one pure and genuine pleasure to feverish London. How beautifully they are placed too, on this sloping bank, with the palm branches waving above them, full of early bees, and mixing their honeyed scent

THE MOLE-CATCHER.

107

with the more delicate violet odour. How transparent and smooth and lusty are the bunches, full of sap and life. And there, just by the old mossy root, is a superb tuft of primroses, with a yellow butterfly hovering over them, like a flower floating on the air. What happiness to sit in this tufty knoll and fill my basket with the blossoms. What a renewal of heart and mind. To inhabit such a scene of peace and sweetness, is again to be fearless, gay, and gentle as a child. Then it is that thought becomes poetry and feeling religion. Then it is that we are happy and good. Oh that my whole life could pass so, floating in blissful and innocent sensation, enjoying in peace and gratitude the common blessings of nature, thankful above all for the simple habits, the healthful temperament, which render them so dear. Alas! who may dare expect a life of such happiness? But I can at least snatch and prolong the fleeting pleasure-can fill my basket with pure flowers, and my heart with pure thoughts-can gladden my little home with their sweetness-can divide my treasures with one, a dear one, who cannot seek them-can see them when I shut my eyes, and dream of them when I fall asleep."

THE MOLE-CATCHER.

"There are no more delightful or unfailing associations," says again our favourite Miss Mitford, "than those afforded by the various operations of the husbandman, and the changes on the fair face of nature. We all know that busy troops of reapers come with the yellow corn; whilst the yellow leaf brings a no less busy train of ploughmen and seedsmen preparing the ground for fresh harvests; that woodbines and wild roses, flaunting in the sloping hedge-rows, give token of gay bands of haymakers which enliven the meadows; and that the primroses, which begin to unfold their pale stars by the sides of green lanes, bear marks of the slow and weary female processions, the gangs of tired yet talkative bean-setters, who defile twice a day through the intricate mazes of our cross-country roads. These are general associations, as well known and as universally recognised as union of mince-pies and Christmas. I have one more private and peculiar-one perhaps the