.

ERIC ERICSON.
One gusty evening--it was of the last day in March--Robert well remembered both the date and the day--a bleak wind was driving up the long street of the town, and Robert was standing looking out of one of the windows in the gable-room.

The evening was closing into night.

He hardly knew how he came to be there, but when he thought about it he found it was play-Wednesday, and that he had been all the half-holiday trying one thing after another to interest himself withhal, but in vain.
He knew nothing about east winds; but not the less did this dreary wind of the dreary March world prove itself upon his soul.

For such a wind has a shadow wind along with it, that blows in the minds of men.
There was nothing genial, no growth in it.