June

I am always sad when June comes to an end. It is the quintessentially English summer month - the month of the Derby, Royal Ascot and Wimbledon, of swallows and strawberries, champagne and roses. June contains the longest day of the year, when it hardly seems worth going to bed, the month when winter is farthest away and it even seems possible that the sunshine will go on for ever. June is long, light evenings and lazy afternoons on the river, Pimms in the garden, swifts screaming overhead, open windows, blackbirds singing in the summer dusk. July, while a great month in its way, is quite a different matter.