pect Hill that these first flowers-wind-flowers, pasque flowers, May-flowers, however one has learned to say them were found in Spring- the anemone patens which, next to pussy-willows themselves, meant to us Spring. A week before Nellie Pitmouth had brought to school the first that we had seen. Nellie had our pity because she drove the cows to pasture before she came to school, but she had her reward, for it was always she who found the first spoils. I re- member those mornings when I would reach school to find a little group about Nellie in whose hands would be pussy-willows, or the first violets, or our rarely found white violets. For a little while, in the light of real events like these, Nellie enjoyed distinction. Then she relapsed into her usual social obscurity and the stigma of her gingham apron which she wore even on half holidays. This day we pressed hard for her laurels, scrambling in the deep mould and dead leaves in search of the star faces on silvery, silken, furry stems. We hoped untiringly that we might some day find arbutus, which grew in abundance only eighteen miles away, on the hills. In Summer we patiently looked for wintergreen, which they were always finding
