SPRING IN BÉARN
May 1
Of a sudden it seems to have come—the poplars fluttering their golden green; the fruit-trees tricked out in fête-day frocks of frail snow-white; the hoary oaks uncurling their baby leaves; and the lanes all littered with golden broom....
The blue flax sways like a sensitive sea; the violets peep from amid the moss; beneath every hedgerow the primroses cluster; and the rivulets tinkle their shrill, glad songs....
Dense levies of orchises empurple the meadows, where the butterflies hasten their wavering flight; the sunlight breathes through the pale-leafed woods; and the air is sweet with the scent of the spring, and loud with the humming of wings....
It lasts but a week—a fleeting mood of dainty gaiety; a quick discarding of the brown shabbiness of winter for a smiling array of white and gold, fresh-green, and turquoise-blue....
And then, it has flitted, and through the long, parched months relentlessly blazes the summer sun.