THE SPRING-TIDE HOLIDAY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19418, 28 August 1926, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE SPRING-TIDE HOLIDAY.

BY EUSJE K MORTON.

During the past week Auckland boys and gills have been making the most of the spring! ime holiday. For the town children there have been many delightful excursions and outings, trips to the Zoo, half-hours of delight with the monkeys, the I tears and the beautiful birds, and perhaps a ride on Jamuna, Auckland's pet elephant The picture-shows have been another source of delight, so that by the time the holidays end you will all have plenty of happy memories to help you over the next three months of school before the long Christinas holiday. It may be that thcic are hundreds of boys and girls in Auckland who know very very little of the joy of springtime in the'country, who have never seen a forest creek in flood, nor searched for the first spring flowers in the bush. Quickly the memory of days of winter rain and cold is lost, in the glory of spring. When spring comes the countryside is a land of beauty and enchantment. The fields are Bpread with a mantle of softest green, all starred and spangled with daisies and golden buttercups. And what wonderful things there aro to be seen in the little streams and the deep pools left in the ditches by the winter rains! Tiny pink and bronze ferns dip down- to the clear water, and on an islet of rushes a big green frog sits and croaks, swelling out his spotted chest and seeming to ask the birds and all tther furred and feathered creatures to please note what a handsome and important person he is. But just watch him when a party of bovs comes laughing and whooping down the road ! All his self-importance vanishes in a trice. One last loud croak, then he kicks up his bright green heels and disappears like magic into the heart ot the pool, where, no doubt, he crouches in shuddering fear unlil his natural enemy, the small boy, has passed. Another enemy comes into sight just as he is thinking of bobbing up to the surf ® c ® again, a pompous old drake, who at . the head of a procession of waddling ducks, who come quack-quacking down the field-track toward the stream. Have vou over watched a procession of ducks . ThfV are the most absurd things marching'solemnly in single file, quacking all the way,..just as though they were telling all the world that , they, a,ud not Mi. and Mrs. .Frog, were quite the most In.pOitunt people alive. And l *' kl " g birds., have you noticed how the black birds and thrushes have begun to sin 3 during the sjast few weeks of spni.g. They gather in the tall poplars and pines by the roadside, and sing on and on, right through the brief twilig'U and nto the darkening hours of night. lhe always khow when winter is ended, and fill the world with their songs of rejoicing that spring has come once more.