Of course I wasn't an idiot.I knew when I looked from our south window exactly what was to be seen.The person who wrote that piece was the idiot.It sang and sounded pretty,and it pulled you up and pushed you out,but really it was a fool thing,as Ivery well knew.I couldn't imagine daisies peeping through frozen grass.Any baby should have known they bloomed in July.
Skunk cabbage always came first,and hepatica.If I had looked from any of our windows and seen daisies and buttercups in March,I'd have fallen over with the shock.I knew there would be frozen brown earth,last year's dead leaves,caved-in apple and potato holes,the cabbage row almost gone,puddles of water and mud everywhere,and I would hear geese scream and hens sing.And yet that poem kept pulling and pulling,and I was happy as a queen--I wondered if they were for sure;mother had doubts--the day I was wrapped in shawls and might sit an hour in the sun on the top board of the back fence,where I could see the barn,orchard,the creek and the meadow,as you never could in summer because of the leaves.I wasn't looking for buttercups and daisies either.I mighty well knew there wouldn't be any.
But the sun was there.A little taste of willow,oak and maple was in the air.You could see the buds growing fat too,and you could smell them.If you opened your eyes and looked in any direction you could see blue sky,big,ragged white clouds,bare trees,muddy earth with grassy patches,and white spots on the shady sides where unmelted snow made the icy feel in the air,even when the sun shone.You couldn't hear yourself think for the clatter of the turkeys,ganders,roosters,hens,and everything that had a voice.I was so crazy with it I could scarcely hang to the fence;I wanted to get down and scrape my wings like the gobbler,and scream louder than the gander,and crow oftener than the rooster.There was everything all ice and mud.They would have frozen,if they hadn't been put in a house at night,and starved,if they hadn't been fed;they were not at the place where they could hunt and scratch,and not pay any attention to feeding time,because of being so bursting full.
They had no nests and babies to rejoice over.But there they were!And so was I!Buttercups and daisies be-hanged!Ice and mud really!But if you breathed that air,and shut your eyes,north,you could see blue flags,scarlet lilies,buttercups,cattails and redbirds sailing over them;east,there would be apple bloom and soft grass,cowslips,and bubbling water,robins,thrushes,and bluebirds;and south,waving corn with wild rose and alder borders,and sparrows,and larks on every fence rider.
Right there I got that daisy thing figured out.It wasn't that there were or ever would be daisies and buttercups among the frozen grass;but it was forever and always that when this FEELcame into the air,you knew they were COMING.THAT was what ailed the gander and the gobbler.They hadn't a thing to be thankful for yet,but something inside them was swelling and pushing because of what was coming.I felt exactly as they did,because I wanted to act the same way,but I'd been sick enough to know that I'd better be thankful for the chance to sit on the fence,and think about buttercups and daisies.Really,one old brown and purple skunk cabbage with a half-frozen bee buzzing over it,or a few forlorn little spring beauties,would have set me wild,and when a lark really did go over,away up high,and a dove began to coo in the orchard,if Laddie hadn't come for me,Iwould have fallen from the fence.
I simply had to get well and quickly too,for the wonderful time was beginning.It was all very well to lie in bed when there was nothing else to do,and every one would pet me and give me things;but here was maple syrup time right at the door,and the sugar camp most fun alive;here was all the neighbourhood crazy mad at the foxes,and planning a great chase covering a circuit of miles before the ground thawed;here was Easter and all the children coming,except Shelley--again,it would cost too much for only one day--and with everything beginning to hum,I found out there would be more amusement outdoors than inside.That was how I came to study out the daisy piece.There was nothing in the silly,untrue lines:the pull and tug was in what they made you think of.
I was still so weak I had to take a nap every day,so I wasn't sleepy as early at night,and I heard father and mother talk over a lot of things before they went to bed.After they mentioned it,I remembered that we hadn't received nearly so many letters from Shelley lately,and mother seldom found time to read them aloud during the day and forgot,or her eyes were tired,at night.
"Are you worrying about Shelley?"asked father one night.
"Yes,I am,"answered mother.
"What do you think is the trouble?"
"I'm afraid things are not coming out with Mr.Paget as she hoped.""If they don't,she is going to be unhappy?"
"That's putting it mildly."
"Well,I was doubtful in the beginning."
"Now hold on,"said mother."So was I;but what are you going to do?I can't go through the world with my girls,and meet men for them.I trained them just as carefully as possible before I started them out;that was all I could do.Shelley knows when a man appears clean,decent and likable.She knows when his calling is respectable.She knows when his speech is proper,his manners correct,and his ways attractive.She found this man all of these things,and she liked him accordingly.At Christmas she told me about it freely.""Have you any idea how far the thing has gone?""She said then that she had seen him twice a week for two months.
He seemed very fond of her.He had told her he cared more for her than any girl he ever had met,and he had asked her to come here this summer and pay us a visit,so she wanted to know if he might.""Of course you told her yes."
