Spring had arrived at last, and although the air and wind were still cold, there was a quality of wa

Spring had arrived at last, and although the air and wind were still cold, there was a quality of warmth in the vernal sunshine which Algy had not felt for six months or more - not to mention an enormous increase in the quantity and intensity of light, which was almost too bright to contemplate after the endless months of dreary darkness under perpetual rain clouds.

Few creatures could resist the joys of such a spring day, and Algy and his little green dragon friend were no exception. When they saw a large clump of daffodils opening their petals in the sun they rushed towards them and revelled in the glory of the golden trumpets.

As Algy watched his friend inspect the unfamiliar flowers, he was delighted to observe that there were several bumblebees buzzing around them, and all the birds of the vicinity were helping to celebrate the coming of spring in their own individual voices. Some only managed a chirrup or a tweet, and some proclaimed their opinions with an incessant “widgy widgy widgy widgy widgy”, but for a moment Algy caught the beautiful sound of the first skylark of the season, singing in the heavens, and he smiled a very large fluffy bird smile.

Resting on the mossy ground under the daffodils, it was inevitable that Algy was reminded of Wordsworth’s famous verses, for, like the poet, he “could not but be gay in such a jocund company”…  although, basking in the sunshine with the little green dragon beside him, Algy was neither wandering nor feeling the slightest bit lonely.

So he hopes you will forgive him if he repeats the often-quoted poem once more for the sake of his dragon friend, for he suspects that the funny wee creature may not have had the usual advantages of a literary education when young

I wander’d lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils,
Beside the lake, beneath the trees
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretch’d in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: -
A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company!
I gazed - and gazed - but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills
And dances with the daffodils.

[Algy is of course quoting the famous poem Daffodils by the 19th century English poet William Wordsworth.]