It is not only children whom the spring winds stir to madness, but a man has striven but poorly if he cannot contrive to bear in patience with this vernal torment of living, or even to turn it to some useful purpose in his work. But children, who can only express themselves in their play, must pay for the joys of the coming summer in moods speechless and almost too bitter for their years. In sympathy with all the green, quick things of Nature, their blood is in a state of passionate unrest for which their minds can supply no adequate reason, and they are unhappy in consequence. But I am far from blaming the Olympians for the attitude they adopted in this difficult business. They kept a wise eye on our health, and if our naughtiness became outrageous, we were punished. For the rest, as they could not give us lips of silver and a pipe of gold with which to chant the amazing gladness of the spring, I do not see what they could do. ON NURSERY CUPBOARDS THEY were deep and wide and tall, and filled as to the lower shelves with a number of objects which no child of spirit could find interesting any longer. Here were the battered fragments of the presents of bygone birthdays, of which the true ownership was dubious, because we none of us would confess that we had ever been young enough to receive such childish gifts. Here also were foolish trifles from forgotten Christmas-trees, useless objects employed by the fraudulent to give their trees a deceitful appearance of wealth. Then there were the presents that were too useful: the elevating gifts of aunts and the improving offerings of god-parents, things that either trespassed on the arid land of lessons or presumed some grown-up virtue which the recipient neither had nor coveted. The Olympians would refer to these dull possessions in the aggregate as “the children’s toys”; but we knew better. Our true treasures, the things we loved, never saw the inside of that unromantic depository save through the thoughtless tidying of our rulers. The works of watches and mechanical toys, our soldiers and cannon of brass, our fleet of walnut boats and empty cartridge-cases—these things and their brothers slept under our pillows or in the very private cardboard boot-box under the bed. By day those that were being employed were spread about the floor or strained our pockets to bursting-point. The people who were too old to know any better referred to them contemptuously as “rubbish,” a word we privately reserved for their aggravating presents. And though the long interval that separated dinner and tea on wet days might weary us of our immediate jewels, it was not in the cupboard that we sought relief from Boredom. It is true that now and again some Gentleman Adventurer would climb on a chair and investigate the shelves that were supposed to be beyond our reach, to return with piratical spoil of matches and cotton and citrate of magnesia, a cate that tingles pleasantly on the tongue of youth.