In the “Indicator” Mr. Leigh Hunt discourses of this beautiful season
with his usual grace. He says--
“The spring is now complete. The winds have done their work. The shaken
air, well tempered and equalized, has subsided; the genial rains,
however thickly they may come, do not saturate the ground, beyond the
power of the sun to dry it up again. There are clear crystal mornings;
noons of blue sky and white cloud; nights, in which the growing moon
seems to lie looking at the stars, like a young shepherdess at her
flock.
“Then the young green. This is the most apt and perfect mark of the
season,--the true issuing forth of the spring. The trees and bushes are
putting forth their crisp fans; the lilac is loaded with bud; the
meadows are thick with the bright young grass, running into sweeps of
white and gold with the daisies and buttercups. The orchards announce
their riches, in a shower of silver blossoms. The earth in fertile woods
is spread with yellow and blue carpets of primroses, violets, and
hyacinths, over which the birch-trees, like stooping nymphs, hang with
their thickening hair. Lilies of the valley, stocks, columbines,
lady-smocks, and the intensely red piony which seems to anticipate the
full glow of summertime, all come out to wait upon the season, like
fairies from their subterraneous palaces.”
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