The red-flowering maple is first in blossom, its beautiful purple flowers unfolding a fortnight before the leaves. The moose-wood follows, with rose-colored buds and leaves; and the dog-wood, robed in the white of its own pure blossoms. Thencomes the sudden rain-storm; and the birds fly to and fro, and shriek. Where do they hide themselves in such storms? at what firesides dry their feathery cloaks? At the fireside of the great, hospitable sun, to-morrow, not before;--they must sit in wet garments until then.
In all climates Spring is beautiful. In the South it is intoxicating, and sets a poet beside himself. The birds begin to sing;--they utter a few rapturous notes, and then wait for an answer in the silent woods. Those green-coated musicians, the frogs, make holiday in the neighbouring marshes. They, too, belong to the orchestra of Nature; whose vast theatre is again opened, though the doors have been so long bolted with icicles, and the scenery hung with snow and frost, like cobwebs. This is the prelude, which announces the rising of the broad green curtain. Already the grass shoots forth. The waters leap with thrilling pulse through the veins of the earth; the sap through the veins of the plants and trees; and the blood through the veins of man. What a thrill of delight in spring-time! What a joy in being and moving! Men are at work in gardens; and in the air there is an odor of the fresh earth. The leaf-buds begin to swell and blush. The white blossoms of the cherry hang upon the boughs like snow-flakes; and ere long our next-door neighbours will be completely hidden from us by the dense green foliage. The May-flowers open their soft blue eyes. Children are let loose in the fields and gardens. They hold butter-cups under each others' chins, to see if they love butter. And the little girls adorn themselves with chains and curls of dandelions; pull out the yellow leaves to see if the schoolboy loves them, and blow the down from the leafless stalk, to find out if their mothers want them at home.
And at night so cloudless and so still! Not a voice of living thing,--not a whisper of leaf or waving bough,--not a breath of wind,--not a sound upon the earth nor in the air! And overhead bends the blue sky, dewy and soft, and radiant with innumerable stars, like the inverted bellof some blue flower, sprinkled with golden dust, and breathing fragrance. Or if the heavens are overcast, it is no wild storm of wind and rain; but clouds that melt and fall in showers. One does not wish to sleep; but lies awake to hear the pleasant sound of the dropping rain.
It was thus the Spring began in Heidelberg.
[CHAPTER II. A COLLOQUY.]
"And what think you of Tiedge's Urania," said the Baron smiling, as Paul Flemming closed the book, and laid it upon the table.
"I think," said Flemming, "that it is very much like Jean Paul's grandfather,--in the highest degree poor and pious."
"Bravo!" exclaimed the Baron. "That is the best criticism I have heard upon the book. For my part, I dislike the thing as much as Goethe did. It was once very popular, and lay about in every parlour and bed-room. This annoyed the old gentleman exceedingly; and I do not wonder at it. He complains, that at one time nothing was sung or said but this Urania. He believed in Immortality; but wished to cherish his belief inquietness. He once told a friend of his, that he had, however, learned one thing from all this talk about Tiedge and his Urania; which was, that the saints, as well as the nobility, constitute an aristocracy. He said he found stupid women, who were proud because they believed in Immortality with Tiedge, and had to submit himself to not a few mysterious catechizings and tea-table lectures on this point; and that he cut them short by saying, that he had no objection whatever to enter into another state of existence hereafter, but prayed only that he might be spared the honor of meeting any of those there, who had believed in it here; for, if he did, the saints would flock around him on all sides, exclaiming, Were we not in the right? Did we not tell you so? Has it not all turned out just as we said? And, with such a conceited clatter in his ears, he thought that, before the end of six months, he might die of ennui in Heaven itself."
"How shocked the good old ladies must have been," said Flemming.
"No doubt, their nerves suffered a little; but the young ladies loved him all the better for being witty and wicked; and thought if they could only marry him, how they would reform him."