Field and Hedgerow

?Field and Hedgerow

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Title: Field and Hedgerow
Author: Richard Jefferies
Release Date: December, 2004 [EBook #7030] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on February 25, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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FIELD AND HEDGEROW
BEING
THE LAST ESSAYS
OF
RICHARD JEFFERIES
COLLECTED BY HIS WIDOW

PREFACE.

For permission to reprint my husband's latest Essays my sincere thanks are due to the Editors of the following publications:-
_The Fortnightly Review._ _Manchester Guardian._ Pall Mall Gazette. _Standard._ _English Illustrated Magazine._ _Longman's Magazine._ _St. James's Gazette._. _Art Journal._ _Chambers's Journal._ _Magazine of Art._ _Century Illustrated Magazine._
J.J.

CONTENTS.

HOURS OF SPRING
NATURE AND BOOKS
THE JULY GRASS
WINDS OF HEAVEN
THE COUNTRY SUNDAY
THE COUNTRY-SIDE: SUSSEX
SWALLOW-TIME
BUCKHURST PARK
HOUSE-MARTINS
AMONG THE NUTS
WALKS IN THE WHEAT-FIELDS
JUST BEFORE WINTER
LOCALITY AND NATURE
COUNTRY PLACES
FIELD WORDS AND WAYS
COTTAGE IDEAS
APRIL GOSSIP
SOME APRIL INSECTS
THE TIME OF YEAR
MIXED DAYS OF MAY AND DECEMBER
THE MAKERS OF SUMMER
STEAM ON COUNTRY ROADS
FIELD SPORTS IN ART: THE MAMMOTH HUNTER
BIRDS' NESTS
NATURE IN THE LOUVRE
SUMMER IN SOMERSET
AN ENGLISH DEER-PARK
MY OLD VILLAGE
MY CHAFFINCH

HOURS OF SPRING.

It is sweet on awaking in the early morn to listen to the small bird singing on the tree. No sound of voice or flute is like to the bird's song; there is something in it distinct and separate from all other notes. The throat of woman gives forth a more perfect music, and the organ is the glory of man's soul. The bird upon the tree utters the meaning of the wind--a voice of the grass and wild flower, words of the green leaf; they speak through that slender tone. Sweetness of dew and rifts of sunshine, the dark hawthorn touched with breadths of open bud, the odour of the air, the colour of the daffodil--all that is delicious and beloved of spring-time are expressed in his song. Genius is nature, and his lay, like the sap in the bough from which he sings, rises without thought. Nor is it necessary that it should be a song; a few short notes in the sharp spring morning are sufficient to stir the heart. But yesterday the least of them all came to a bough by my window, and in his call I heard the sweet-briar wind rushing over the young grass. Refulgent fall the golden rays of the sun; a minute only, the clouds cover him and the hedge is dark. The bloom of the gorse is shut like a book; but it is there--a few hours of warmth and the covers will fall open. The meadow is bare, but in a little while the heart-shaped celandine leaves will come in their accustomed place. On the pollard willows the long wands are yellow-ruddy in the passing gleam of sunshine, the first colour of spring appears in their bark. The delicious wind rushes among them and they bow and rise; it touches the top of the dark pine that looks in the sun the same now as in summer; it lifts and swings the arching trail of bramble; it dries and crumbles the earth in its fingers; the hedge-sparrow's feathers are fluttered as he sings on the bush.
I wonder to myself how they can all get on without me--how they manage, bird and flower, without me to keep the calendar for them. For I noted it so carefully and lovingly, day by day, the seed-leaves on the mounds in the sheltered places that come so early, the pushing up of the young grass, the succulent dandelion, the coltsfoot on the heavy, thick clods, the trodden chickweed despised at the foot of the gate-post, so common and small, and yet so dear to me. Every blade of grass was mine, as though I had planted it separately. They were all my pets, as the roses the lover of his garden tends so faithfully. All the grasses of the meadow were my pets,