Mirror of the Months

by P. G. Patmore

Now, those most active and industrious of the feathered tribes, the Swallows and House Martins, bring out their young broods into the cherishing sunshine, and having taught them to provide for themselves, they send them “about their business,” of congregating on slate-roofed houses and churches, and round the tops of belfry towers; while they (the parents) proceed in their periodical duty of providing new flocks of the same kind of “fugitive pieces,” as regularly as the editors of a Magazine.

Now may be observed that singular phenomenon which (like all other phenomena) puzzles all those observers who never take the trouble of observing. Whole meadows, lanes, and commons, are covered, for days together, with myriads of young Frogs, no bigger than horse-beans,—though there is no water in the immediate neighbourhood, where they are likely to have been bred, and the ponds and places where they are likely to breed are entirely empty of them. “Where can they have come from in this case, but from the clouds?” say the before-named observers. Accordingly, from the clouds they do come, the opinion of all such searching inquirers; and I am by no means sure they will be at all obliged to me for telling them, that the water in which these animals are born is not their natural element, and that, on quitting their Tad-pole state, they choose the first warm shower to migrate from their birth-place, in search of that food and home which cannot be found there. The circumstance of their almost always appearing for the first time after a warm shower, no doubt encourages the searchers after mystery in assigning them a miraculous origin.

Now, the Bees (those patterns of all that is praiseworthy in domestic and political economy) give practical lessons on the Principles of Population, by expelling from the hive, vi et armis, all those heretofore members of it who refuse to aid the commonweal by working for their daily honey. When they need those services which none but the Drones can perform, they let them live in idleness and feed luxuriously. But as the good deeds of the latter are of that class which “in doing pay themselves,” those who benefit by them think that they owe the doers no thanks, and therefore, when they no longer need them, send them adrift, or if they will not go, sacrifice them without mercy or remorse. And this—be it known to all whom it may concern (and those are not a few)—this is the very essence of Natural Justice.

Now, as they are wandering across the meadows thinking of nothing less, gleams of white among the green grass greet the eyes of bird-nesting boys, who all at once dart upon the welcome prize, and draw out from its hiding-place piece-meal what was once a Mushroom; and forthwith mushrooming becomes the order of the day.—Now, the lowermost branches of the Lime-tree are “musical with Bees,” who eagerly beset its almost unseen blossoms—richer in sweets than the sweetest inhabitants of the garden.

Finally, now we occasionally have one of those sultry days which make the house too hot to hold us, and force us to seek shelter in the open air, which is hotter;—when the interior of the Blacksmith’s shop looks awful, and we expect the foaming porter pot to hiss, as the brawny forger dips his fiery nose into it;—when the Birds sit open-mouthed upon the bushes; and the Fishes fry in the shallow ponds; and the Sheep and Cattle congregate together in the shade, and forget to eat;—when pedestrians along dusty roads quarrel with their coats and waistcoats, and cut sticks to carry them across their shoulders; and cottagers’ wives go about their work gown-less; and their daughters are anxious to do the same, but that they have the fear of the Vicar before their eyes;—when every thing seen beyond a piece of parched soil quivers through the heated air; and when, finally, a snow-white Swan, floating above its own image, upon a piece of clear cool water into which a Weeping-Willow is dipping its green fingers, is a sight not to be turned from suddenly.

But we must no longer delay to glance at the Garden, which is now fuller of beauty than ever: for nearly all the flowers of last month still continue in perfection, and for one that has disappeared, half a dozen have started forward to supply its place.

Against the house, or overhanging the shaded arbour, among Shrubs, we have the Jasmin, shooting out its stars of white light from among its throng of slender leaves; and the white Clematis (well worthy of both its other names, of Virgin’s Bower, and Traveller’s Joy) flinging its wreaths of scented snow athwart the portico, and rivaling the Hawthorn in sweetness; and the Syringa, sweeter still. Now, too, the large Lilies lift up their lofty heads proudly, and do not seem to forget that they once held the rank of Queens of the Garden;—the rich-scented white one looking, in comparison with the red, what a handsome Countess does to a handsome Cook-maid.

Among the less aspiring we have now several whose beauty almost makes us forget their want of sweetness. Conspicuous among these are the Convolvulus, whose elegant trumpet-shaped cups open their blue eyes to greet the sun, and, at his going down, close them never to open again; and the Nasturtium, as gaudy in its scarlet and gold as an Officer of the Guards on a levee day; and the fine-cut Indian Pink; and the profuse Larkspur, all flower, shooting up its many-coloured cones here and there at random, or ranging them in rich companies, that rival the Tulip-beds of the Spring.

In the Orchard and Fruit-Garden the hopes of the last month begin in part to be realized, and in all to be confirmed. The elegant Currant, red and white (the Grape of our northern latitudes), now hangs its transparent bunches close about the parent stem, and looks through its green embowering leaves most invitingly. But there you had best let it hang as yet, till the Autumn has sweetened its wine with sunbeams: for Autumn is your only honest wine-maker in this country; all others sweeten with sugar-of-lead instead of sunshine.—The Gooseberry, too, has gained its full growth, but had better be left where it is for awhile, to mature its pleasant condiment. As for the Tarts into which it is the custom to translate it during this and the last month,—they are “pleasant but wrong.”—Now, too, is in full perfection the most grateful fruit that grows, and the most wholesome—the Strawberry. I grieve to be obliged to make “odious comparisons” of this kind, between things that are all alike healthful, where the partakers of them are living under natural and healthful circumstances. But if Man will live upon what was not intended for him, he must be content to see what was intended for him lose its intended effect. The Strawberry is the only fruit in which we may indulge to excess with impunity: accordingly I hereby give all my readers (the young ones in particular) Mr. Abernethy’s full permission to commit a debauch of Strawberries once every week during this month, always provided they can do it at the bed itself; for otherwise they are taking an unfair advantage of nature, and must expect that she will make reprisals on them.—Now, too, the Raspberry is delicious, if gathered and eaten at its place of growth. There it is fragrant and full of flavour, elsewhere flat and insipid.

The other fruits of this month are Apricot, one or two of the early Apples, and if the season is forward a few Cherries. But of these, the two latter belong by rights to the next month; so till then we leave them. And as for Apricots, they look handsome enough at a distance, against the wall; but they offer so barefaced an imitation of the outward appearance of Peaches and Nectarines, without possessing any one of their intrinsic merits, that I have a particular contempt for them, and beg the reader to dismiss them from his good graces accordingly.