Not that we grieve , when , after some seven months of storm and bitter frost , Spring , in the guise of a flower-crowned virgin , is seen driving away the hoary despot , pelting him with violets by the handful , and strewing green grass on the path behind him . Often , ere he will give up his empire , old Winter rushes fiercely back , and hurls a snow-drift at the shrinking form of Spring ; yet , step by step , he is compelled to retreat northward , and spends the summer months within the Arctic circle . Such fantasies , intermixed among graver toils of mind , have made the winter 's day pass pleasantly . Meanwhile , the storm has raged without abatement , and now , as the brief afternoon declines , is tossing denser volumes to and fro about the atmosphere . On the window-sill , there is a layer of snow , reaching half-way up the lowest pane of glass . The garden is one unbroken bed . Along the street are two or three spots of uncovered earth , where the gust has whirled away the snow , heaping it elsewhere to the fence-tops , or piling huge banks against the doors of houses . A solitary passenger is seen , now striding mid-leg deep across a drift , now scudding over the bare ground , while his cloak is swollen with the wind . And now the jingling of bells , a sluggish sound , responsive to the horse 's toilsome progress through the unbroken drifts , announces the passage of a sleigh , with a boy clinging behind , and ducking his head to escape detection by the driver . Next comes a sledge , laden with wood for some unthrifty housekeeper , whom winter has surprised at a cold hearth . But what dismal equipage now struggles along the uneven street ? A sable hearse , bestrewn with snow , is bearing a dead man through the storm to his frozen bed . O , how dreary is a burial in winter , when the bosom of Mother Earth has no warmth for her poor child ! Evening -- the early eve of December -- begins to spread its deepening veil over the comfortless scene ; the firelight gradually brightens , and throws my flickering shadow upon the walls and ceiling of the chamber ; but still the storm rages and rattles , against the windows . Alas ! I shiver , and think it time to be disconsolate . But , taking a farewell glance at dead Nature in her shroud , I perceive a flock of snow-birds , skimming lightsomely through the tempest , and flitting from drift to drift , as sportively as swallows in the delightful prime of summer . Whence come they ? Where do they build their nests , and seek their food ? Why , having airy wings , do they not follow summer around the earth , instead of making themselves the playmates of the storm , and fluttering on the dreary verge of the winter 's eve ?
Every Sabbath morning XXXXX the summer time I thrust back the curtain , to watch the sunrise stealing down a steeple , which stands opposite my chamber-window .
On across after among around at for in of within