We are at the wood now, at last. We have followed a pleasant stream that played hide-and-seek among its willows, and, while we talked and listened, we have gathered in gleanings of its beauty. And now we cross the narrow plank--parting the branches that half conceal it--and enter the wood. There are tiny pink balls ready to burst into vivid buds, gemming the hawthorn bushes; but the trees and underwood are bare, except for the willow catkins and the hazel tassels, or perhaps the dull green of the elder in a tuft here and there, or the early leaf-bud of a twining honeysuckle. But the pale smooth ash saplings, tall and slim, and silver-grey in the sun, with a narrow shadow edge, the branches studded with black buds; and the golden twigs of the white-stemmed birch; and the warm light brown of the hazel boughs; and the red of the cherry,--these make the wood, though bare, yet neither dull nor colourless. And here, farther in, the many stems are fringed and bearded with the hoary and abundant growth of lichen, cool as the bloom on a greengage, against the pale orange which still lingers in ragged patches upon the six-feet stalks of last year’s bracken. [Illustration] Certainly there is, all around us in the wood, much material for musing. But we have come hither for a special end. For it is the thirteenth of March, and by this time the first of the train of those songsters, that fly to warmer shores to escape our Winter, ought to have returned. So, all ears, we proceed over the crisp leaves, disturbing the bobbing rabbits. And there! I heard the note--simple enough, yet pleasing even in itself, and sweet as being the forerunner of songs more rich. _Chiff-chaff_,--this dissyllable gives this Willow-wren’s note and name. There is not much in it, may be, still it is the little tuning-fork of the coming concert. And we are reminded by it of some gentle spirit which longs and tries to say a cheery and hopeful word to a heart which has been under wintry skies; that which it repeats may not indeed be very new, very powerful, or very varied; still, it is accepted and loved for the sake of its truth and affection. This bird has a relation, due some few days later, whose song, though but little more pretentious, is yet a great favourite with me. I call it the laughing Willow-wren; and indeed its note does at once suggest a small silvery peal of merry light-hearted glee. Again and again, peal after peal; flitting through the boughs, almost the tiniest of slim birdlings. “Gaiety without eclipse,”