Happily, God blessed the Pilgrims with an early and mild spring.[168] By the middle of March the birds began to sing; the streams shook off their icy cerements; the rills ran laughing to the sea; Nature put on her gala drapery; the myriad wild-flowers opened their drowsy eyes; the time had come for the ever-marvellous resurrection of the year. The forests seemed instinct with life. On every hill-side nature hymned her praise. The settlers shared in the buoyant and joyous feeling. They had met and mastered the New England winter. Their houses were built. Their family arrangements were completed; and now “the fair, warm days” of spring, the idyl of the year, were a harbinger of hope. Careful and provident, the Pilgrims improved this delightful weather in planting. “On the 19th and 20th of March,” says the old chronicler, “we digged our grounds and sowed our garden-seed.”[169] This done, individual members of the community began to stray into the bordering forest, incited thereto partly by natural curiosity to familiarize themselves with the salient local features of their wilderness homes, and partly by the pursuit of game. Sometimes the tyro hunters were startled by strange sights and noises; for to them the dim, still woods were a mystery. “John Goodman was much frightened this day”—so runs the entry in the Journal on one occasion—“he went abroad for a little walk with his spaniel. Suddenly two great wolves ran after the dog, which ran to him and betwixt his legs for succor. He, having nothing with him, threw a stick at one of them, and hit him, and they presently both ran away; but they came again. He got a plain board in his hand, and they sat both on their tails grinning at him a good time. At last they went their way and left him. He could not move fast, as he had lame feet.”[170] On another occasion a storm is recorded: “At one o’clock it thundered. The birds sang most pleasantly before this. The thunder was strong, and in great claps, followed by rain very sadly till midnight.”[171] Thus far they had seen no Indians since landing at Plymouth. Traces of them abounded. Pale wreaths of smoke, which curled above the forest-trees, gave certain token that they lurked in the vicinity. The settlers knew that they must ere long meet the aborigines, and they awaited the event with mingled hope and apprehension. On the 16th of March, one of the warmest, pleasantest days of the early spring, a number of the Pilgrims—Bradford, Winslow, Hopkins, and Carver, among the rest—were gathered on the skirts of the settlement, chatting over their plans and projects for the coming days, when suddenly a guttural shout was heard, and the words “_Welcome, Englishmen!_” spoken in broken Saxon, fell on their ears.[172]