Let us go on now, for I want to get some watercress from the brook--the first green growing thing for the table thus far!--and some pussy-willows for the same table, only not to eat. (There are many good things in this world that are not good to eat.) If the sun were shining I should take you by way of the beehives to show you, dropping down before their open doors, a few eager bees bringing home baskets of pollen from the catkins of the hazelnut bushes. The hazelnut bushes are in bloom! Yes, in bloom! No, the skunk-cabbages are not out yet, nor the hepaticas, nor the arbutus; but the hazelnut bushes are in bloom, and--see here, under the rye straw that covers the strawberry-bed--a small spreading weed, green, and cheerily starred with tiny white flowers! It is the 21st of March; the sun has crossed the line; the phœbes have returned; and here under the straw in the garden the chickweed,--_starwort_,--first of the flowers, is in blossom! But come on; I am not going back yet. This is the last day of winter. Cold? Yes, it is cold, raw, wretched, gloomy, with snow still in the woods, with frost still in the ground, and with not a frog or hyla anywhere to be heard. But come along. This is the last day of winter--of winter? No, no, it is the first day of spring. Robins back, phœbes back, watercress for the table, chickweed in blossom, and a bird’s nest with eggs in it! Winter? Spring? Birds’ eggs, did I say? The almanac is mixed again. It always is. Who’s Who in the Seasons when all of this is happening on the 21st of March? For here is the bird’s nest with eggs in it, just as I said. Watch the hole up under that stub of a limb while I tap on the trunk. How sound asleep! But I will wake them. _Rap-rap-rap!_ There he comes--the big barred owl! Climb up and take a peek at the eggs, but don’t you dare to touch them! Of course you will not. I need not have been so quick and severe in my command; for, if we of this generation do not know as much about some things as our fathers knew, we do at least know better than they that the owls are among our best friends and are to be most jealously protected. Climb up, I say, and take a peek at those round white eggs, and tell me, Is it spring or winter? Is it the last day, or the first day, or the first and last in one? What a high mix-up is the weather--especially this New England sort! But look at that! A snowflake! Yes, it is beginning to snow--with the sun crossing the line! It is beginning to snow, and down with the first flakes, like a bit of summer sky drops a bluebird, calling softly, sweetly, with notes that melt warm as sunshine into our hearts. “For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.” But see how it snows! Yes, but see-- The willows gleam with silver light; The maples crimson glow-- The first faint streaks on winter’s east, Far-off and low.