sluggish waters, and run up the brooks toward their sources. All nature revives at this season. With her it is really a new life. It cheers me to behold the swarms of gnats which have revived in the spring sun. The fish lurks by the mouth of its native brook watching its opportunity to dart up the stream by the cakes of ice. Do the fishes stay to hold prayer-meetings in Fair Haven Bay, while some monstrous pike gulps them down? Or is not each one privately, or with kindred spirits, as soon as possible, stemming the course of its native brook, making its way to more ethereal waters, burnishing its scaly armor by its speed? . . . . No wonder we feel the spring influences. There is a motion in the very ground under our feet. Each rill is peopled with new life rushing up it.
In order that a house and grounds may be picturesque and interesting in the highest degree, they must suggest the idea of necessity, proving the devotion of the builder, not of luxury. We need to see the honest and naked life here and there protruding. What is a fort without any foe before it? that is not now sustaining and never has sustained a siege? The gentleman whose purse is always full, and who can meet all demands, though he employs the most famous artists, can never make a very interesting seat. He does not carve from near
