material reason why. He may confess, although there is but a trifle more
sunshine than a month ago--and what influence a trifle where there is so
much--and scarcely any difference of temperature, that Nature is insisting
on obedience to one of her mighty laws--the law of heredity. Why,
therefore, refrain from justifying the allusion? Why persist in
declining the invitations of the hour? Far be it from me to do so. Is
sufferance the cognizance of this Free Isle?

All my days are Days of the Sun. All my days are holy. Duty may suggest
the propriety of contentment within four walls. Inclination and the
thrill of the season lure me to gloat over the more manifest of its
magic. Be sure that, unabashed and impenitent, shall I riot over sordid
industry during the most gracious time of year to hearken to the
eloquence and accept the teachings of unpeopled spaces.

Such is the silence of the bush that the silken rustle of the butterflies
becomes audible and the distinctive flight of birds is recognised--not
alone such exaggerated differences as the whirr of quail, the bustle of
scrub fowl, and the whistle and clacking of nutmeg pigeons, but the
delicate and tender characteristics of the wing notes of the meeker kinds
of doves and the honey-eaters, and also the calculated flutterings of the
fly-catchers. In the whistling swoop of the grey goshawk there is a note
of ominous blood-thirstiness, silent though the destroyer has sat
awaiting the moment for swift and decisive action.

Seldom, even on the stillest evening, may the presence of the night-jar
be detected, except by its coarse call, while the sprightly little
sun-bird flits hither and thither, prodigal of its vivid colours and
joying with machine-like whirring. The sun-bird exemplifies the
brightness of the day. All its activities are bold and conspicuous. Aptly