Mirror of the Months

by P. G. Patmore

Now, hard frosts, if they come at all, are followed by sudden thaws; and now, therefore, if ever, the mysterious old song of our school days stands a chance of being verified, which sings of

“Three children sliding on the ice
All on a summer’s day!”

Now, the labour of the husbandman recommences; and it is pleasant to watch (from your library window) the plough-team moving almost imperceptibly along, upon the distant upland that the bare trees have disclosed to you. And now, by the way, if you are wise, you will get acquainted with all the little spots that are thus, by the bareness of the trees, laid open to you, in order that, when the summer comes, and you cannot look at them, you may be able to see them still.

But we must not neglect the garden; for though “Nature’s journeymen,” the gardeners, are undergoing an ignoble leisure this month, it is not so with Nature herself. She is as busy as ever, if not openly and obviously, secretly, and in the hearts of her sweet subjects the flowers; stirring them up to that rich rivalry of beauty which is to greet the first footsteps of Spring, and teaching them to prepare themselves for her advent, as young maidens prepare, months beforehand, for the marriage festival of some dear friend.

If the flowers think and feel (and he who dares to say that they do not is either a fool or a philosopher—let him choose between the imputations!)—if the flowers think and feel, what a commotion must be working within their silent hearts, when the pinions of Winter begin to grow, and indicate that he is at least meditating his flight! Then do they, too, begin to meditate on May-day, and think on the delight with which they shall once more breathe the fresh air, when they have leave to escape from their subterranean prisons; for now, towards the latter end of this month, they are all of them at least awake from their winter slumbers, and most are busily working at their gay toilets, and weaving their fantastic robes, and shaping their trim forms, and distilling their rich essences, and, in short, getting ready in all things, that they may be duly prepared to join the bright procession of beauty that is to greet and glorify the annual coming on of their sovereign lady, the Spring. It is true none of all this can be seen. But what a race should we be, if we knew and cared to know of nothing, but what we can see and prove!

“Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes,
He is a slave—the meanest you can meet.”

But there is much going on in the garden now that may be seen by “the naked eye” of those who carefully look for it. The bloom-buds of the shrubs and fruit-trees are obviously swelling; and the leaves of the lilac are ready to burst forth at the first favourable call. The laurestinus still braves the winds and the frosts, and blooms in blithe defiance of them. So does the China rose, but meekly, and like a maiden who will not droop though her lover be away; because she knows that he is true to her, and will soon return.

Now, too, the viable heralds of Spring approach, but do not appear; or rather, they appear, but have not yet put on their gorgeous tabards or surcoats of many colours. The tulips are but just showing themselves, shrouded closely in their sheltering alcoves of dull green. The hyacinths, too, have sent up their trim fences of green, and are just peeping up from the midst of them in their green veils,—the cheek of each flower-bud pressed and clustering against that of its fellow, like a host of little heads peeping out from the porch of an ivy-bound cottage, as the London coach passes.

Now, too, those pretty orphans, the crocuses and snowdrops—those foundlings, that belong neither to Winter nor Spring—show their modest faces scarcely an inch above the dark earth, as if they were afraid to rise from it, lest a stray March wind should whistle them away.

Finally, now appear, towards the latter end of the month, those flowers that actually belong to Spring—that do not either herald her approach, or follow in her train, but are in fact a part of her, and prove that she is virtually with us, though she chooses to remain incognita for a time. The prettiest and most piquant of these in appearance are the brilliant little Hepaticas, crowding up in sparkling companies from the midst of their dark ivy-like leaves, and looking more like gems than flowers.