THE mantle of green is decidedly the most appropriate wherewith to invest the fair form of Spring; but while we watch her coming in that guise, full often, as though indeed in masquerade, a robe of glistening ice effectually precludes recognition of her presence. There is no month or season of the year that has not won the tribute of remembrance in the strains of poesy; but while shivering over the fire on the cold March mornings, it is an unnecessary infliction, to read in the journals of the day innumerable verses commemorating the glad return of Spring. Enough of disenchantment follows naturally and inevitably, enough of shabby experience in place of the bright ideal, without making the vagaries of Nature the medium for another lesson. Leave these rejoicings till capricious April, or the sunny hours of May, when they may be read in harmonious concord with the pleasant sights and sounds around us.

"The bold March wind!
The merry, boisterous, bold March wind!
Who in the violet's tender eyes
Casts a kiss, and forward flies.

So writes Barry Cornwall: though there probably may be violets' eyes to kiss even in March, still it is only the poet's own sympathy, for the time, with merry boisterousness, that makes the wind seem hastening on such a pleasant, saucy errand. In more dismal remembrance of the month, Shelley wrote,

"March with grief doth howl and rave."

This interpretation recalls the painfully impressive picture of the desolate wanderer that stood by the river's brink on a gloomy March night;

"The one more unfortunate,
Weary of breath,
Sadly importunate,

Gone to her death."

In utter, helpless wretchedness, reckless of the future, save that it must be free from the mere struggle to live-the one bitter anxiety of the present-unshrinkingly she sought the only refuge that was left to her despair.

"The bleak wind of March

Made her tremble and shiver; But not the dark arch,

Or the black flowing river;
Mad from life's history,
Glad to death's mystery,
Swift to be hurled-
Anywhere, anywhere,

Out of the world!"

The fearful plunge-the sleep that followsmust bring relief. Wherever she may wake, there can at least be no once-familiar faces to turn averted from her appealing gaze. No voices to sound more harsh or unsympathizing, than have sounded the voices of some of the stern, immaculate ones of earth, in answer to

her-the outcast.

"Where the lamps quiver,

So far in the river, With many a light From window and casement, From garret to basement, She stood with amazement, Houseless by night."

To the blank misery of her soul there flashed a moment's wild, half-stupid wonderment, as she looks round on that city full of homes, and asks why there is no shelter for her defenceless head? Asks how any ban of guilt or shame could bar every door against her? A sister to these virtuous inmates, a sister fashioned by the hand of God, "young and so fair." In that half-ruined heart may still have lingered much of goodness, ay, and of untainted purity. But who was there to question of the fallen? To speak in mercy, to consider in justice, her errors, her "evil behaviour"? Want and destitution may have given the dread alternative to sin or perish, and all unguided in the hour of trial, she became for ever exiled from the innocent. Her undoubting confidence may have betrayed her,

"And when love's wild prayer
Dissolved in air,

Her woman's heart gave way;
But the sin forgiven

By One in heaven

By man is cursed alway." March is reckoned the third month of the year with us; with the Romans it was counted the first. It was named by them from Mars, the god of war, because he was the father of their first prince. The Saxons called it lenctmonat, or length-month, as the days then begin to grow longer than the nights. Lenct, or Lent, also signifies spring.

There are many customs and holidays recorded as appertaining exclusively to March, and some movable festivals that only occasionally occur during this month. Most of the peculiar observances connected with these different anniversaries have fallen into desuetude; but, either through their origin or symbolical significance, may retain an interest for us.

The wearing of leeks on the 1st of March, in honour of St. David, the tutelar saint of the Welsh, by all who owed him allegiance, was once very generally practised. Shakespeare introduces a mention of this Welsh usage into the play of Henry V.

"Pistol.-Knowest thou Fluellen?

you take occasion to see leeks hereafter, I pray you mock at them, that is all." This fashion was doubtlessly in vogue at the time Shakespeare wrote. It is said to have been derived from St. David himself, who died in the year 550, so it is entitled to all the prestige antiquity imparts. During a great battle, he commanded the Britons under King Cadwallader to distinguish themselves by this emblem. By virtue of their valour, his prayers, or the mystical properties of this vegetable spell, they won a proud victory over the Saxons on that occasion, and wore the leek in grateful remembrance ever after.

Collop Monday and Shrove Tuesday occur this year in the first week of March. The observance of these days, as a time of feasting and revelry, is an adoption from the Roman feasts celebrated at the same season in honour

of Bacchus, which were always accompanied with many ceremonies. Shrove is a corruption of the old Saxon word "shrive," signifying confession. On this Confession Tuesday, the bells used to be rung throughout every parish in England, summoning sinners to an acknowledgment of their sins. Since the Protestant era, this has of course been in a great measure abolished. So also of the popular games and merry-makings that were wont to signalize its recurrence. From a universal practice of eating pancakes on this day, it acquired the appellation of "Pancake day." The practice, by the way, has not yet grown obsolete; it seems half a pity that such a harmless and agreeable mode of remembrance ever should become so.

There is mention of these pleasant delicacies, whose annual devouring we would have perpetuated, in an old poem, dated 1634. Then every stomach,

"Till it can hold no more,

Is fritter-filled, as well as heart can wish;
And every man and maid doe take their turne,
And toss their pancake up for fear they burne;
And all the kitchen doth with laughter sound,
To see the pancakes fall upon the ground."

Eating pancakes on Shrove Tuesday was doubtlessly taken from the heathen Fornicalia,

"K. H.-Do not you wear your dagger in your cap that day, lest he knock that about yours."

Also, in a dialogue between the King and Fluellen, the latter says, "I do believe your majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek upon St. Tavy's day;" and the King answers, "I wear it for a memorable honour, for I am a Welsh, you know, good countryman." It will be remembered that Fluellen forced Pistol to eat the leek he ridiculed: and after it is swallowed, leaves him with this exhortation: "When

brance of the bread made before ovens were invented by the goddess Fornax.

On the 17th of March, many hundred years ago, died St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland. He is said to have performed many miracles, and to have been withal a very jovial personage. The anniversary of his death is commemorated in the mode that it is easy to suppose his saintship could best sympathize with, and most heartily approve, if the popularly accredited tradition concerning him be founded on fact. "When St. Patrick was dying, he requested his weeping and lamenting