tween the snow storms, is like a speck of clear blue sky seen near the end of a storm, reminding us of an ethereal region, and a heaven which we had forgotten. Princes and magistrates are often styled serene, but what is their turbid serenity to that ethereal serenity which the bluebird embodies. His most serene Birdship! His soft warble melts in the ear as the snow is melting in the valleys around. The bluebird comes, and with his warble drills the ice, and sets free the rivers and ponds and frozen ground. As the sand flows down the slopes a little way, assuming the forms of foliage when the frost comes out of the ground, so this little rill of melody flows a short way down the concave of the sky.
The sharp whistle of the blackbird, too, is heard like single sparks, or a shower of them, shot up from the swamp and seen against the dark winter in the rear.
March 2, 1860. There is a strong westerly wind, to-day, though warm, and we sit under Dennis's Lupine promontory to observe the water. A richer blue than the sky ever is. The flooded meadows are ripple lakes on a large scale. The bare landscape, though no growth is visible in it, is bright and spring-like. There is the tawny earth (almost completely bare) of different shades, lighter or darker, the light very light in this air, more so than the surface
