March 25th

1825

March 25th 1825
I took a walk to-day to botanize & found that the spring had taken up her dwelling in good earnest she has covered the woods with the white anemone which the children call Lady smocks & the harebells are just venturing to unfold their blue drooping bells the green is coverd with daiseys & the little Celandine the hedge bottoms are crowded with the green leaves of the arum were the boy is peeping for pootys with eager anticipations & delight—the sallows are cloathed in their golden palms were the bees are singing a busy welcome to spring they seem uncommonly fond of these flowers & gather round them in swarms—I have often wonderd how these little travellers found their way home agen from the woods & solitudes were they journey for wax & honey I have seen them to-day at least 3 miles from any village in Langley wood working at the palms & some of them with their little thighs so loaded with the yellow dust as to seem almost unable to flye it is curious to see how they collect their load they keep wiping their legs over their faces to gather the dust that settles there after creeping in the flowers till they have got a sufficient load & then they flye homewards to their hives—I have heard that a man curious to know how far his bees travelld in a summers day got up early one morning & stood by one of the hives to powder them as they came out with fine flour to know them agen & in the course of an hour afterwards he observd some of them at the extremity of the Lordship & having to go to the market that day he passd by a turnip field in full flower about 5 miles from home & to his supprise he found some of his own in their white powdered coats busily humming at their labour with the rest

John Clare
(John Clare (13 July 1793 – 20 May 1864) was an English poet, born the son of a farm labourer who came to be known for his celebratory representations of the English countryside and his lamentation of its disruption.)