The story of my house

by George H. Ellwanger

Down in the hollows of the wood where the wind-flowers grow, under the meadow-grasses where the blue flag and lily bulbs wait, below the waters to bid the marsh marigolds and arrowheads rise, into the farthest swamps where the orchid hides, in waste places where tares and teazles crowd, on countless hillsides and in countless valleys must the sunbeams penetrate and quicken to awakened life. And all this gradually, little by little, day by day, hour by hour, bringing forth each blossom at its appointed time, giving the butterfly his wings, providing the bee his sustenance. What is there here on earth to compare with the miracle of returning spring, the labor and strength of the Sun? The power of Hercules a trillion fold is concentrated in the rays that are loosing the fetters of the streams to-day. Lo! the marvel of the renascent year, when Earth renews her youth and Nature is born again.

The March days pass, and more and more is the Sun’s strength felt. His vassals, the showers and the south winds, he calls to aid him in his task; and at once the grasses and larches turn green and arbutus and bloodroot are fanned into bloom. A mile away the sunshine lights the hills; a league away it burnishes and warms the river. Daily the beams stream upon the earth and reveal fresh treasures. Swiftly a shadow steals along the hills. The tempered April rain falls from the gray April sky. Responsive, the sward assumes a brighter green, the daffodil a richer gold. The sap mounts to the topmost branches and penetrates the minutest twigs. Day by day the naked sprays are feathered by the pushing buds. A scarf of green is flung across the copse. The shadblow silvers the woods, columbine and cranesbill throng the slopes, and hepatica and dog-tooth violet nod to the quickening breeze of spring.

The spring days pass, but the miracle remains; hourly a new marvel is wrought by the sunlight and the shower. The oriole appears and orchards burst into bloom; the wood-thrush sings and the dogwood and wild thorn join the flowering pageant. The warm perfumed breath of the new year floats upon the air—the breath of flower and grass and expanding bud. Nature’s color-box opens anew; her brush is laid upon each petal with what consummate address and variety!—pink upon the petals of the peach, a flush on the cheek of the apple bloom, a gloss of gold upon the buttercup. The Trillium thrusts up its snowy triangles, the gold-thread its white stars, and banks become purple with violets. Tiny polypody and oak-fern replume the stumps and bowlders. From the frost-smitten meadows and waste places rise fresh pennants of green. Unfurled is the flag of spring. And the hues and odors that are still in embryo and the sunshine is preparing—all the sweets of June and the infinite beauties of midsummer, the wealth of the roses, the clover bloom, the labyrinthine tangle of wild flowers, even to the asters and colored leaf of autumn. The foam and surge of the apple bloom are but a wave of the color and fragrance that is to be. Æons ago the March sunlight fell upon the flowers and primeval nature. Vegetation welcomed it then as it welcomes it now. Next year and the next year and centuries hence will it fall upon the earth and work out the miracle of spring. Is it not new and ever beautiful, this vernal resurrection? That we, too, possessed this subtle alchemy and might extract this elixir from the April sun!

How the wings of the doves glisten and mirror the rays as I watch them floating by my windows! I love my flock of doves—the dove is so associated with the relentment of the elements and the olive leaf of spring. A monotonous life they lead in their diurnal circlings round the barn and their self-same route over their circumscribed domain—a monotonous life, at least, it appears to the observer, while probably the very reverse to them. Every load of grain which comes to the neighboring barns they may note from their vantage-ground and meditate upon its special virtues. The droppings of the barley now being stored in yonder granary undoubtedly form as weighty a subject to them as the fluctuations in the market do to the maltster himself. Then the incertitude which must attend the obtaining of their supply of food naturally furnishes them with a constant source of speculation; besides, who but they themselves may know what petty bickerings and jealousies form the daily routine of their inner life? The jaunty leader of the flock who curves his iris neck so proudly may be the humblest of hen-pecked fathers in the privacy of his home; and what appears to be the approving cooings of devoted dames may be only a prosaic homily on the part of his exacting wives.

My flock of doves seem alway idling and courting the sunbeam. Now, apparently, they are drifting aimlessly upon the air; again they veer suddenly, to turn a gleaming wing for me to admire. With what indescribable grace the circling forms hover over the eaves after each of their tours of investigation, the swiftly fanning wings seeming to cease their motion simultaneously as the flock alights, and once more preens its iris in the sun. Indecision is a characteristic of my flock of doves—always uncertain of the direction they would take, and apparently never satisfied for more than a passing moment with their surroundings. No sooner have they flown to the meadow beyond the copse than they are back again; and scarcely have they perched upon the roof or discovered fresh pickings ere they take flight in another direction, to return as quickly. Is it that they, like the rest of us, are never content, and that much must have more? I should like to quote them a lyric from John Wilbye’s Second Set of Madrigals, which possibly they may not have heard:

I live, and yet methinks I do not breathe;

I thirst and drink, I drink and thirst again;

I sleep, and yet do dream I am awake;

I hope for that I have; I have and want;

I sing and sigh; I love and hate at once.