soon attract attention wherever they appear. They are arrant corn thieves, all of them. It is odd, that although differing in many respects, these birds of black plumage, with the crow at their head, have an especial partiality for the maize.
Saturday, 29th.—The tamaracks are putting forth their bluish green leaves, the lightest in tint of all their tribe; the young cones are also coming out, reminding one somewhat of small strawberries by their color and form, but they soon become decidedly purple, then green, and at last brown. The tamarack is very common about the marshy grounds of this county, attaining its full height in our neighborhood. There are many planted in the village, and in summer they are a very pleasant tree, though inferior to the European larch. Some individuals become diseased and crooked—a great fault in a tree, whose outline is marked by nature with so much regularity—though the same capricious broken line often becomes a beauty in wood of a naturally free and careless growth. This defect is much more common among transplanted tamaracks, than with those you find growing wild in the low grounds.
May 1st.—Cloudy sky; showery; not so bright as becomes May-day. Nevertheless, we managed to seize the right moment for a walk, with only a little sprinkling at the close. It would not do to go into the woods, so we were obliged to be satisfied with following the highway. By the rails of a meadow fence, we found a fine border of the white puccoon; these flowers, with their large, pure white petals, look beautifully on the plant, but they soon fall to pieces after being gathered, and the juice in their stalks stains one’s hands badly. We gathered a few, however, by way of doing our Maying, adding to them some violets scat-
