in azure now out of grey mist grew
my own sweet violet, shy and blue,
with eyes of smiling sunshine
and tears of diamond dew.
the prince of winter sat on the mountains and gazed upon the valley.
he knew that spring must soon be here and anxiously looked out for him. but there was nothing to see but snow and snow and yet more snow; and he began to think that young spring was afraid.
he laughed scornfully and sent his gales howling round the mountain-peaks. wildly they rushed over the hills, snapped great trees in the wood and broke the ice on the river to pieces. they drove the floes before them, flung them over the meadows and whipped the water into foam.
“there, there!” said winter. “softly, my children, softly!”
he bade them go down again; and, grumbling, they crept round behind the mountains.
when night came and the stars twinkled, winter stared at the river with his cold eyes; and there and then there was ice again upon the water. but the[27] waves broke it into two at once. they leapt and danced and cracked the thin crust each time that it formed over them.
“what’s this?” asked winter, in surprise.
at that moment, a soft song sounded far down in the valley:
play up! play soon!
keep time! keep tune!
ye wavelets, blue and tender!
winter clutched his great beard and leant forward to listen. now the song sounded again and louder:
play up! play soon!
keep time! keep tune!
ye wavelets, blue and tender!
keep tune! keep time!
burst ice and rime
in equinoctial splendour!
up sprang winter and stared, with his hand over his brows.
down below in the valley stood the prince of spring, young and straight, in his green garb, with the lute slung over his shoulder. his long hair flowed in the wind, his face was soft and round, his mouth was ever smiling, his eyes were dreamy and moist.
“you come too soon!” shouted winter.
but spring bowed low and replied:
“i come by our appointment.”
“you come too soon!” shouted winter again. “i am not nearly done. i have a thousand bags full of snow and my gales are just as strong and biting as they were in january.”
“that is your affair, not mine,” said spring, calmly. “your time is past now, and my sway is beginning. withdraw in peace to your mountains.”
then winter folded his strong, hairy hands and looked anxiously at spring:
“give me a short respite!” he said. “i implore you to grant me a little delay. give me a month, a week; give me just three poor days.”
spring did not answer, but looked out over the valley, as though he had not heard, and loosened the green silk ribbon by which he carried his lute.
but the prince of winter stamped on the mountains till they shook and clenched his fists in mighty anger:
“go back to whence you came,” he said, “or i shall turn my snows over you and bury you so deep that you will never find your way out of the valley. i shall let loose my storms till your wretched strains are drowned in their roaring. your song shall freeze in your throat. wherever you walk or stand, i shall follow your tracks. whatever you call forth by day i shall slay by night.”
spring raised his head and strode through the valley. he plucked harder at the strings of his lute and every tree in the forest bent forward to listen. the earth sighed under the snow, the waves of the river stood still and heard and then joined in the song, as they leapt towards the sea. winter himself swallowed his anger for a moment and listened to spring’s song:
in vain thy prayer would soften, in vain thy menace frighten;
behind the blackest cloud-wrack, the sunbeams laugh and lighten.
it rang through the valley in long, loud, solemn tones; and echo answered from every hill and mountain.
but winter shook his clenched fists to the sky and shouted aloud:
“out, all my mighty storms! out with you, out! burst down upon the valley and shatter and destroy all this! rush over the hills and snap every tree in the forest! overturn the mountains, if you can, and crush yonder green mountebank beneath them!”
out rushed the storm; and the snow came. it was awful weather. the trees creaked and crashed and fell, the river overflowed its banks, the foam of the waves spurted right up to the sky, great avalanches of snow poured down the mountain-slope.
[33]but spring went his way through the valley and sang, in ever fuller and stronger tones:
let all thy loud winds bluster, let all thy tempest bellow;
let all thy white, bright snow-birds loose, across the meadow flying!
behold my foot is on the bridge and all the ice-flowers dying!
thou knowest thy power in the vale has met its conquering fellow.
“better than that!” shouted winter. “roar, storm; whirl, snow; lash, rain; beat, hail!”
and the storm roared louder; and the snow whirled down. it grew as dark as though the sun, the moon and all the stars had been put out. great blocks of stone rolled down over the valley; the mountains shook and split. it was as though the end of the world had come.
but high through the murk shone spring’s green garb; and louder than storm and thunder rang his song. earth and air and water sang with him: the poorest blade of grass beneath the snow, the crow in the wood, the worm in the mould, each of them joined in the song according to its power. even the trees that fell in the forest under the onslaught of the storm confessed spring in the hour of their death:
thou knowest it were best to yield to save thy might from falling;
thou knowest i am come to drape the porch of summer’s palace.
[35]
thy victims, harried on the hills and murdered in the valleys,
awake to life, to happy life, at my soft song’s recalling.
then winter gave in.
the storm flew north over the mountains with a howl; and it stopped snowing. the river returned to its bed. now and again there was a crash in the forest, when a branch that had been struck by lightning fell to the ground. otherwise all was still.
and then it began to thaw.
the snow had often sparkled in the sun and rejoiced, but that was a different sun from the one that now stared down upon it. the sun now riding in the skydisliked the snow and the snow disliked the sun.
“what on earth do you want here?” asked the sun and stared with ever-increasing curiosity.
and the snow felt quite awkward and wished itself miles away. it melted up above till great holes came; and it melted down below till it suddenly collapsed and turned to nothing, more or less. everywhere underneath it, the water ran in rills: through the wood, down the hillside, over the meadow, out in the river, which carried it patiently to the sea. everywhere stood puddles of water, large and small; they soaked slowly into the ground, as its frozen crust disappeared by degrees. but sometimes they had to wait, for the ground was hard put to it to drink so much at a time.
and, while it thawed, harder and harder, and the coat of snow grew thinner every day, spring stood on the edge of the wood and bowed to the earth and sang:
my little snowdrop, gentle sprite,
thy heart was ever brave and bright.
not once it faltered, pierced with fright,
at winter’s white wrath bleeding.
under spring’s song, a hundred snowdrops burst from the ground and shone forth white and green. they nodded their heavy heads; and spring nodded to them. but then he went on, till he stopped again, farther away, and sang:
and quick, each tiny crocus, too,
put on your frocks of daintiest hue,
frocks yellow, white and dusky-blue,
in full first clusters leading!
the crocuses at once opened their flowers and strutted, short as they were, for they were ever so proud of being among the first. but, while they were still swarming out, already spring was in a fresh place and sang:
climb, whitlow-grass, thy willow-mast!
o where art thou? yet sleeping fast?
thou wast not wont to enter last:
up, lower plants preceding!
and all the willow-branches were filled forthwith with the yellow flowers of the whitlow-grass, which nodded gladly to the crocuses and snowdrops. and spring sang again:
dear fresh spurge-laurel, briskly grow!
thou, whose keen lance with fiery glow
would burst the lap of the cold snow,
come forth: obey my pleading!
there stood the spurge-laurel, like a bright-red birch-rod ready for use on ash wednesday. but spring pulled the lower branches of the bush aside and bent still more deeply towards the ground and sang more softly than ever:
thou of all symbols, dearest yet,
my true, my lovely violet!
soon sun will burn, soon rain will wet:
be ready, no call needing!
and the violet shot up its broad green leaves from the ground to show spring that it was ready.
then the mist floated out over the valley. no one could see where it came from, but it came and remained for many a long day.
they were strange, silent days. everywhere, everything oozed and bubbled and rustled and seethed in the ground; and there was not a sound besides. noiselessly, the mist glided over[41] the hills and into the woods and hung heavy dew-drops on every single twig. and the dew-drops dripped and fell from morn till eve and from eve till morn.
so thick was the mist that the river was hidden in it, till one could only hear it flow. and the hills were hidden and the woods, till one saw nothing but the outside trees and even that only as shadows against the damp, grey wall of mist.
but where the mist was thickest there was spring. and the thicker the mist grew the brighter shone spring’s green garb. and, all the time that the water oozed and the dew-drops dripped and the river flowed, spring sang:
softly slipping,
little drop, go dripping, dripping!
but up in the mountains lay the prince of winter and lurked. he saw how the snow melted and disappeared; he saw the flowers come and could do nothing to prevent it. the snow melted right up in the mountains; and he felt that it would become a bad business indeed if he did not put a stop to it.
so he stole down to the valley in the darkness of the night; and, next morning, there was ice on the puddles and the mist lay beaten down upon the meadow in sparkling hoar-frost.
but, when the young prince of spring saw this, he only laughed:
“that’s no use,” he said.
then he raised his young face to the sky and called:
“sun! sun!”
and the sun appeared.
the clouds parted at once; and the sun melted the ice and the hoar-frost. then he hid again behind the clouds. the mist floated over the hills anew, everything oozed and bubbled and rustled and dripped. the snowdrop and the crocus and the willow-wood blossomed that it was a joy to see; and the violet cautiously stuck its buds above ground.
“now all is well!” said spring.
and, as he spoke, a sprightly wind came darting over the hills.
it shook the dew-drops from the boughs of the trees, till they fell to the ground in a splashing rain. then it fluttered through the old dry grass in the meadow, crested the waves of the river and scattered the mist in no time. then it set about drying the wet ground and drove the clouds over the mountains. there they remained hanging and hid the angry face of winter. but, day after day, the sun rode in a bright blue sky; and it grew warm in the valley.
then the violet burst forth. it hid bashfully among its broad green leaves, but its scent spread wide over the meadow. and spring plucked at the strings of his lute and sang till the valley rang again:
in azure now out of grey mist grew
my own sweet violet, shy and blue,
with eyes of smiling sunshine
and tears of diamond dew.
and, when spring had sung that song—and it rang to the top of the mountain, to the bottom of the river, to the very ends of the valley—then everything came on at about the same time and at a pace that can hardly be described.
[46]at night, the valley was full of sound. but none could hear it whose heart was not full of green boughs. for it was the sound of buds bursting, little green sheaths unrolling, twigs stretching, flowers opening, scent spreading and grass growing.
by day, it was sometimes sunshine and sometimes rain, but always good. and what happened then could be seen by any one who had eyes to see with.
first, the ground in the wood became quite white with anemones. so white did it all become that the prince of winter, who was peeping down through a rift in the clouds, thought for a moment that there was snow. he was gladder than he had been since february. but, when he saw his mistake, he stole into the wood one night, for the last time, and bit in two the necks of all the flowers that he could.
but a thousand new ones came for every one that died. and in the midst of the anemones stood the larkspur and the lungwort, which had blue and red flowers, to suit your fancy; the star of bethlehem, which was a bright golden-yellow, but modest nevertheless; the wood-sorrel, which was so delicate that it withered if you but touched it; the cowslip; and the speedwell, which was small enough, but very blue and proud as lucifer.
the meadow got itself a brand-new grass carpet, ornamented with yellow patches of buttercups and dandelions. along the ditches it was bordered with dear little cuckoo-flowers and out towards the river it had a fringe of rushes that grew broader and thicker day by day. below, from the bottom of the lake, sprang the water-lily’s thick stalks, vying one with the other who should reach the surface first; and the frogs, who had been sitting in the mud and moping all through the winter, crawled out and stretched their hindlegs and swam up and uttered their first “quack! quack!” in such a way that you could not have helped feeling touched.
but the crows and the sparrows and the chaffinches, who had spent the winter down in the valley, raised so great a hubbub that it seemed as though they had taken leave of their senses. they ran round the meadow and pecked at the soft ground and nibbled at the grass, though they knew quite well that it would disagree with them. they flapped their wings and shouted, “hurrah for spring!” in a way that showed they meant it. the tit was there too and the wren, small as she was. for they had been there all the time, like the others, and fared just as hard.
and the crow simply did not know which leg to stand upon. he started a croaking-match with his old woman, with whom he had lived the year before and all through the winter and with whom, since last february, he had had a great quarrel about a dead stickleback. the sparrow sat down beside his missus, stuck his nose in the air and sang as though he were the nightingale himself. the tit was perfectly delirious with spring. he shut his eyes and told his mate the maddest stories about delicious worms and big, fat flies that flew right down your throat without your having to stir a wing. and mr. chaffinch got himself a grand new red shirt-front, which made mrs. chaffinch nearly swoon away with admiration. but the wren, whose husband had died of hunger at christmas, preened and polished her feathers so that she might be taken for the young and lively widow that she was.
and the prince of spring laughed and nodded kindly to them:
“you are a smart lot, one and all of you,” he said. “and you have gone through trouble and deserve a happy day. but now i must get hold of my own birds.”
he turned to the south and clapped his hands and sang:
come, sweet lark and siskin small,
blackcap, do not dally!
swallow, thrush, come one, come all!
spring is in the valley.
up and down fly all day through,
fear no wintry shadow!
earth is green and heaven is blue,
flowers spring in the meadow.
singing, piping, hasten here!
come, each tuneful darling!
come from far and come from near,
lapwing, stork and starling!
then the air hummed with the beat of a thousand wings and the army of birds of passage fell like a host upon the valley. each night the air was vocal with the passing of the birds; and in the morning there was no end to the twittering.
there sat the starling and whistled in his black dress-coat, with all the orders on his breast. the swallow swept through the air; siskin and linnet, nightingale and blackcap hopped about in the copsewood. the reed-warbler struck his trills in the rushes along the river-banks so touchingly that one could weep to hear it, the thrush took the deep notes and the goldfinch the high ones, the cuckoo ventured upon his first call and the lapwing sat on his mound and swaggered. but the stork walked in the meadow and never vouchsafed a smile.
meanwhile, the whole wood had come out, but the leaves were still small, so that the sun was able to peep down at the anemones. lilies of the valley distilled their fragrance for dainty nostrils and woodruffs theirs for noses of the humbler sort. the green flowers of the beech dangled from the new thin twigs; cherry and blackthorn were white from top to toe; valerian and star of bethlehem and lousewort did their best. the shepherd’s pouch, that blossomed the whole year round, was annoyed that no one took any notice of it, but the orchis stood and looked mysterious and uncanny, because it had such strange tubers in the ground.
far in the beech-thicket, where it was greenest and prettiest, sat a lovesick siskin and courted his sweetheart, who hopped on a twig beside him and looked as if she simply could not understand what he was driving at.
he sang:
if only, love, thou wilt be mine,
if now my singing heard is,
a nest i’ll give thee soft and fine
with four delightful birdies.
where rows of beech a glade enfold,
we’ll build with toil and trembling;
our birdies shall have beaks of gold,
their daddy much resembling.
to thee i’ll prove both true and kind,
while bonds of love secure thee;
of flies such multitudes i’ll find
as no words could ensure thee.
at dawn of day i labour will,
the nest shall be thy keeping;
each night, when sunset seeks the hill,
i’ll serenade thee sleeping.
when he had sung his ditty to the end, he looked hard at her and, as she did not answer him at once, he gave her a sound peck with his beak.
“don’t do that!” she said.
but, when he ceased pecking at her and raised his wings, as though he meant to fly away, she hastened to sing:
yes, i will be thy own dear love,
of bairns we’ll prate together;
with few would i have flown, dear love;
so preen a prouder feather!
then they flew singing through the wood. and they were hardly gone before two other birds came and sat on the same twig and sang the same thing in another manner.
but the leaves of the beech grew and there came more and more. they gathered closer and closer over the wood and, one fine day, it was quite impossible for the sun to find a hole to peep through.
then the anemones became seriously frightened:
“shine on us, sun, or we shall die!” they cried.
they cried to the wind to sweep the horrid leaves away, so that the sun could see his own dear little anemones. they cried to the beech that it ought to be ashamed of itself, great, strong tree that it was, for wishing to kill innocent flowers. they cried to spring to help them in their distress.
but the sun did not see them and spring did not hear them and the beech took no heed of them and the wind laughed at them. there was such gladness in the valley that it drowned their voices; and they died quite unnoticed.
every single day, new flowers came which were radiant and fragrant. every single day, the birds discovered a new trill to add to their song. the stag[59] belled in the glade, before even the sun was up, and the hind answered and sprang. every second, the fish leapt in the water; and there was no end to the croaking of the frogs in the ditch. the snake wriggled along the edge of the brook and made play with his tongue; in every hedge sat small brown mice exchanging amorous looks. even the flies buzzed more fondly than usual.
but, when the gladness was at its highest, the young prince of spring stood at the top of the valley, where the mountains enclose it towards the north. he looked out over his kingdom. his eyes were moist and dreamy, his mouth was ever smiling. he loosened from his shoulder the green silk ribbon in which his lute was slung, plucked once more at the strings and hummed to its accompaniment. it was a beautiful, hazy day, a day on which the birds subdued their songs and the flowers closed their petals.
and spring bowed over a little blue flower that sprouted at his foot and sang, sadly:
forget-me-not blue,
thou dreamy one,
thou charming one,
thou sweet one!
then he went northwards. and, wherever he set his foot, the snow melted and the flowers burst forth.
but, when he had come to the last place from which he could see the valley, he turned round.
and far away towards the south, where the valley runs into the plain, stood the prince of summer, tall and straight. his face and his hands were brown with the sun, his eyes gentle and warm as the sun. over his shoulder he wore a purple cloak, around his loins a golden girdle. in the girdle was a wonderful red rose.
then spring bowed low and went away over the mountains.
