g the summer months, and
impressive it is to watch the coming of the big transparent drops, each
a small world in itself,--one unbroken ocean without islands hurling
free through the air like planets through space. But still more
impressive to me is the coming of the snow-flowers,--falling stars,
winter daisies,--giving bloom to all the ground alike. Raindrops blossom
brilliantly in the rainbow, and change to flowers in the sod, but snow
comes in full flower direct from the dark, frozen sky.

The later snow-storms are oftentimes accompanied by winds that break up
the crystals, when the temperature is low, into single petals and
irregular dusty fragments; but there is comparatively little drifting on
the meadow, so securely is it embosomed in the woods. From December to
May, storm succeeds storm, until the snow is about fifteen or twenty
feet deep, but the surface is always as smooth as the breast of a bird.

Hushed now is the life that so late was beating warmly. Most of the
birds have gone down below the snow-line, the plants sleep, and all the
fly-wings are folded. Yet the sun beams gloriously many a cloudless day
in midwinter, casting long lance shadows athwart the dazzling expanse.
In June small flecks of the dead, decaying sod begin to appear,
gradually widening and uniting with one another, covered with creeping
rags of water during the day, and ice by night, looking as hopeless and
unvital as crushed rocks just emerging from the darkness of the glacial
period. Walk the meadow now! Scarce the memory of a flower will you
find. The ground seems twice dead. Nevertheless, the annual resurrection
is drawing near. The life-giving sun pours his floods, the last
snow-wreath melts, myriads of growing points push eagerly through the
steaming mold, the birds come back, new wings fill the air, and fervid
summer life comes surging on, seemingly yet more glorious than before.

This is a perfect meadow, and under favorable circumstances exists
without manifesting any marked changes for centuries. Nevertheless, soon
or late it must inevitably grow old and vanish. During the calm Indian
summer, scarce a sand-grain moves around its banks, but in flood-times
and storm-times, soil is washed forward upon it and laid in successive
sheets around its gently sloping rim, and is gradually extended to the
center, making it dryer. Through a considerable period the meadow
vegetation is not greatly affected thereby, for it gradually rises wit