On the second day of February, the ground-hog, true to his traditions, emerged from his hole, and looked about him cautiously for his shadow. Fortunately, it was not in attendance. And by this token the spring was early, and all the chill rains, and late frosts, and unpropitious winds, and concomitant calamities, that might have ensued had he found his ill-omened shadow awaiting him, were escaped. It was not long afterward that small protuberances appeared on every twig and wand and branch, although the trees had not budded save in these promissory intimations. The sap was stirring. The dead world was quickened again. That beautiful symbolism of the miracle of resurrection was daily presented in the reawakening, in the rising anew of the spring. So pensively gladsome it was, so gently approaching, with such soft and subtle languors! The sky was blue; the clouds how light, how closely akin to the fleecy mists! Sheep-bells were tinkling—for what! the pastures were already green! And here and there a peach-tree beside a rail-fence burst forth in a cloud of blossoms so exquisitely petaled, so delicately roseate, that only some fine ethereal vagary of the sunset might rival the tint. Sometimes among the still leafless mountains these pink graces of color would appear, betokening the peach orchard of some hidden little hut, its existence only thus attested. The Scolacutta River was affluent with the spring floods: a wild, errant stream this, with many a wanton freak, with a weakness for carrying off its neighbor’s rails; for snatching huge slices of land from the banks; for breaking off trees and bushes, and whirling them helplessly down its current, tossing and teetering in a frantic, unwilling dance. Many a joke had it played before and since the disaster to old Griff’s mill. The sunbeams might seem the strings of a harp; whenever touched by a wing they were quivering and thrilling with songs. Slow wreathing blue smoke curled in fields here and there where the fires of rubbish blazed; sometimes a stump would burn sullenly all night and char slowly, and with a puff of wind burst anew into flames. The soft lustres of the Pleiades and the fiery Aldebaran were resplendent in the heavens, and the moon was the paschal moon. A vernal thrill had blessed the wild cherry, and it gave out its glad incense. For miles and miles the exquisite fragrance from its vast growths on the mountain-side pervaded the air. And presently the mountain-side wore the tender verdure of budding leaves, and even the gloomy pines were tipped with new tufts of vivid green, unlike their sombre hue; and here and there crags flaunted a bourgeoning vine, and the wild ivy crept on the ground where the wood violet bloomed. All day the ploughs turned the furrow, and the air echoed with the calls “gee, haw” to the slow oxen.