He uncovers the straw-berries
and the grape-vines, salts the asparagus-bed, and plants the peas.
You ask if he planted them with a shot-gun. In the shade there is
still frost in the ground. Nature, in fact, still hesitates; puts
forth one hepatica at a time, and waits to see the result; pushes up
the grass slowly, perhaps draws it in at night.
This indecision we call Spring.
It becomes painful. It is like being on the rack for ninety days,
expecting every day a reprieve. Men grow hardened to it, however.
This is the order with man, - hope, surprise, bewilderment, disgust,
facetiousness. The people in New England finally become facetious
about spring. This is the last stage: it is the most dangerous.
When a man has come to make a jest of misfortune, he is lost. "It
bores me to die," said the journalist Carra to the headsman at the
foot of the guillotine: "I would like to have seen the continuation."
One is also interested to see how spring is going to turn out.
A day of sun, of delusive bird-singing, sight of the mellow earth,
- all these begin to beget confidence. The night, even, has been warm.
But what is this in the morning journal, at breakfast? - "An area of
low pressure is moving from the Tortugas north." You shudder.
What is this Low Pressure itself, - it?
