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+ margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + } + div.minstrelpoem div.poem { + margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 0%; + margin-bottom: 0em; + } + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Minstrel Weather, by Marian Storm + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Minstrel Weather + +Author: Marian Storm + +Illustrator: Clinton Balmer + +Release Date: January 23, 2012 [EBook #38645] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MINSTREL WEATHER *** + + + + +Produced by Irma Spehar, Markus Brenner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="titlepage"> +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 341px;"> +<img src="images/illo_025.jpg" width="341" height="202" alt="Cover Illustration" title="Cover Illustration" /> +</div> + +<p class="booktitle">Minstrel Weather</p> + +<p class="writtenby"><i>by</i></p> + +<p class="author">Marian Storm</p> +</div> + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 369px;"><a name="The_Milky_Way" id="The_Milky_Way"></a> +<img src="images/illo_frontispiece.jpg" width="369" height="609" alt="The Milky Way Revealed to Lonely Herdsmen" title="The Milky Way Revealed to Lonely Herdsmen" /> +</div> + + +<p class="booktitle">Minstrel Weather</p> + +<p class="writtenby">BY</p> + +<p class="author">MARIAN STORM</p> + +<p class="illustrator">With Illustrations and Decorations<br /> +By Clinton Balmer</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 119px; padding-top: 0em; padding-bottom: 0em"> +<img src="images/logo.jpg" width="119" height="125" alt="Publisher Logo" title="Publisher Logo" /> +</div> + +<div class="quote"> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Knowledge, we are not foes.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Long hast thou toiled with me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the world with a great wind blows,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Crying, and not of thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="signature">EURIPIDES</p> +</div> + +<p class="publisher">HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS</p> +<p class="publishedin">NEW YORK AND LONDON</p> + + +<p class="copyright"><span class="smcap">Minstrel Weather</span><br /> + +<br />Copyright, 1920, by Harper & Brothers<br /> + +Printed in the United States of America<br /> + +Published November, 1920 + +<!-- <br /> --> +<!-- <small>K–U</small> --> + +</p> + + +<p class="dedication"><i>For</i></p> + +<p class="dedication">AMY LOVEMAN</p> + +<p class="dedication"><i>The Minstrel Made His Tune<br /> +of Hours and Seasons</i></p> + +<div class="minstrelpoem"> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dewfall, moonrise, high sweet clover,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Chimney swifts at their twilight play;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quail call, owl hoot, moth a-hover,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Midnight pale at the step of day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Star wane, cobweb, brown-plumed bracken;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Morning laughs, with the frost in flower;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Duck flight, hound cry; wild grapes blacken.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Day leaps up at the amber hour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sun dark, snowcloud, eaves ice cumbered,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Gray sand piled on a carmine West;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Faint wing, flake dance; winds unnumbered<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Swing the cradles where leaf-buds rest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wide light, bough flush, gold-fringed meadows,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Berries red in the rippled grass;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stream song, nest note, dream deep shadows<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Drawn back slowly for noon to pass.<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + + + + +<h2 class="contents"><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + +<div class="center"> +<table class="toc" summary="Contents"> +<tr><th class="chaphdr">CHAP.</th><th></th><th class="pagehdr">PAGE</th></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">Faces of Janus</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">A Woodland Valentine</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">Ways of the March Hare</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">The April Moment</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">The Crest of Spring</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_25">25</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">Hay Harvest Time</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">The Month of Yellow Flowers</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">The Mood of August</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_43">43</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">Summer Pauses</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">X.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">When the Oaks Wear Damson</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_54">54</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">November Traits</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">XII.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">The Christmas Woods</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_66">66</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">XIII.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">Landscapes Seen in Dreams</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_72">72</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">XIV.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">Hiding Places</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">XV.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">The Play of Leaves</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">XVI.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">The Brown Frontier</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_90">90</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="chapno"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">XVII.</a></td><td class="chaptitle"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">Far Altars</a></td><td class="onpage"><a href="#Page_96">96</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + +<h2 class="contents"><a name="ILLUSTRATIONS" id="ILLUSTRATIONS"></a>ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + +<div class="center"> +<table class="illustrations" summary="Illustrations"> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#The_Milky_Way">The Milky Way Revealed to Lonely Herdsmen</a></td><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center"><small><i>Frontispiece</i></small></td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#Firelight_at_Play">The Comforting Symbolism of Firelight at Play upon Clean Hearths</a></td><td class="facing"><small><i>Facing p.</i></small></td><td class="onpage">4</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#The_Powers_of_Light">The Powers of Light</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">10</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#The_Fairies_Sleep">On the Topmost Boughs the Fairies Sleep</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">26</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#Coming_Summer">The Rejoicing Shout of Coming Summer</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">28</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#The_Swooping_Bat">The Swooping Bat Darts Noiselessly</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">34</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#The_Mountaineers_Girl">Now the Mountaineer’s Girl Hurries Indoors at Nightfall from the Hallooing Specter of the Wild Huntsman in the Clouds</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">54</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#Baldwins_Mellow_by_Twelfth-night">Baldwins Mellow by Twelfth-night</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">58</td></tr> +<tr><td class="illotitle"><a href="#December_Acknowledges_an_Unpitying_Fate">December Acknowledges an Unpitying Fate—Anything May Happen</a></td><td class="facing">"</td><td class="onpage">68</td></tr> +</table></div> + + + +<h1>MINSTREL WEATHER</h1> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 343px;"> +<img src="images/illo_001.jpg" width="343" height="252" alt="Chapter I" title="Chapter I" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.<br /> + +FACES OF JANUS</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 96px;"> +<img src="images/initial_t.jpg" width="96" height="110" alt="T" title="T" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">T</span>hough</span> January has days +that dress in saffron for their +going, and noons of yellow +light, foretelling crocuses, the +month is yet not altogether +friendly. The year is moving now toward +its most unpitying season. Nights +that came on kindly may turn the meadows +to iron, tear off the last faithful leaves +from oaks, drive thick clouds across the +moon, to end in a violent dawn. January +holds gentle weather in one hand and blizzards +in the other, and what a blizzard can +be only dwellers on prairies or among the +mountains know. Snow gone mad, its +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>legions rushing across the land with daggers +drawn, furious, bearing no malice, but +certainly no compassion, and overwhelming +all creatures abroad: bewildered flocks, +birds half frozen on their twigs, cattle +unwisely left on shelterless ranges, and +people who lose the way long before +animals give up. Snow hardly seems made +of fairy stars and flowers when its full +terror sweeps Northern valleys or the interminable +solitudes of the plains. The +gale so armed for attack owns something +of the wicked intention which Conrad says +that sailors often perceive in a storm at +sea. The rider pursued by a blizzard may +feel, like the tossed mariner, that “these +elemental forces are coming at him with +a purpose, with an unbridled cruelty which +means to sweep the whole precious world +away by the simple and appalling act of +taking his life.” We do not smile at the +pathetic fallacy when we are alone with +cold. The overtaken mountaineer understands—it +means to get him. These things +happen in places where weather is not +obedient to wraps and furnaces, but where +it must be fought hand to hand and where +the pretty snow tangles its victim’s feet +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>and slowly puts him to sleep in a delicious +dream of warmth. Tropical lightning has +not the calm omnipotence of cold when +it walks lonely ways.</p> + +<p>January knows days on which the haze +of spring and the dim tenderness of the +sunshine tempt the rabbit to try another +nap <i>al fresco</i>, indiscreet though he knows +it to be. Even the woodchuck must turn +over and sniff in his sleep as the thaw +creeps downward; and the muskrat takes +his safe way by water once more, while the +steel trap waits on the bank, to be sprung +humanely by a falling cone. The lithe red +fox glides across the upper pastures and +weaves among the hardhack unchallenged, +for this is not hunting weather. A fleeting +respite comes to the tormented mink. +Toward the last of the month, innocent +of the February and March to come, pussy +willows, ingenuously deceived by the +brief mildness, come out inquisitively and +stand in expectation beside the brook, +convinced that this ice is only left over—what +can have delayed the garnet-veined +skunk’s cabbage, always on hand the +first of all? So many willows are needed +by the florists that perhaps they do not +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>pay heavily for their premature debut. +But they are all gray now. In March +they show a cloudy crimson and yellow +not alone of the final blossom, but of their +fur. There are plenty of scarlet rose hips +in uplifted clusters, for the birds somehow +neglect them while they pursue other +delicacies of the same color and contour. +Nature has probably told the winter chippies +that rose hips are no good—spring decorations +must not be pilfered by the snow +sprites. Puffballs have broken off from old +logs, and in walking through low woods +you may step on one here and there, +awakening the fancy that the world is +burning, under its sad cloak of sepia leaves, +and sending up small puffs of smoke to +warn those who have trodden it in love +and comprehension.</p> + +<p>When the winsome skies turn stony, +and melancholy winter rain ends in chill +mist, January has days to breathe whose +air is like breathing under water, down in +spring-cold lake, where the incredible, +pleasureless fishes move through their gray +element, finding pallid amusement perhaps +in nudging frogs and turtles, well tucked +up under a blanket of mud. They are +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>cold-blooded, of course, and not supposed +to mind the oppressiveness of the liquid +atmosphere. But after ourselves moving +in such an environment it is marvelous to +ponder that any creatures prefer it, and +good to foreknow that our own world will +swim out into a splendid frosty weather.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 365px;"><a name="Firelight_at_Play" id="Firelight_at_Play"></a> +<img src="images/illo_004.jpg" width="365" height="564" alt="The Comforting Symbolism of Firelight" title="The Comforting Symbolism of Firelight" /> +</div> + +<p>For its days of quiet sparkle we would +remember January, not for lashing tempests, +April delusions, or brooding fog. +Unbroken snow with blazing spangles +shifting as the sun moves, and above it +twittering sparrows clinging by one claw +to stalks of yarrow or mustard while they +shake the seeds loose with the other; old +stone walls suddenly demonstrating that +they have color, when the foreground is +white, and showing bluish, brown, earthen +red, and gray alight with mica; streams +covered with pearly ice that floods into +brilliant orange at sunset; spruce and hemlock +imperiously outlined on even far-off +hills; skating-time without and kindled +logs within—that is the midwinter we remember +when the sterner messengers sped +from the Pole have gone again. Were it +not for the blizzard we might fail to know +so well the comforting symbolism of firelight +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>at play upon clean hearths. Many +go all their lives, aware only of the coziness +or inconvenience of winter, never facing +the daggered gale alone, nor struck by the +terror of a hostile Nature or the awe of +cold that may not soon relent. What one +perceives in the volcano, tidal wave, or +blizzard, another is spared; the lesson, +perhaps, being postponed until he is ready +for it. Spring comes sweetly to the milliners’ +this month. To the wilderness +with rapid and menacing step comes full +winter.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 340px;"> +<img src="images/illo_007.jpg" width="340" height="244" alt="Chapter II" title="Chapter II" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.<br /> + +A WOODLAND VALENTINE</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_f.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="F" title="F" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">F</span>orces</span> astir in the deepest +roots grow restless beneath +the lock of frost. Bulbs try +the door. February’s stillness +is charged with a faint +anxiety, as if the powers of light, pressing +up from the earth’s center and streaming +down from the stronger sun, had troubled +the buried seeds, who strive to answer +their liberator, so that the guarding mother +must whisper over and over, “Not yet, +not yet!” Better to stay behind the +frozen gate than to come too early up into +realms where the wolves of cold are still +aprowl. Wisely the snow places a white +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>hand over eager—life unseen, but perceived +in February’s woods as a swimmer feels +the changing moods of water in a lake fed +by springs. Only the thick stars, closer +and more companionable than in months +of foliage, burn alert and serene. In February +the Milky Way is revealed divinely +lucent to lonely peoples—herdsmen, mountaineers, +fishermen, trappers—who are +abroad in the starlight hours of this grave +and silent time of year. It is in the long, +frozen nights that the sky has most red +flowers.</p> + +<p>February knows the beat of twilight +wings. Drifting north again come birds +who only pretended to forsake us—adventurers, +not so fond of safety but that they +dare risk finding how snow bunting and +pine finch have plundered the cones of the +evergreens, while chickadees, sparrows, and +crows are supervising from established +stations all the more domestic supplies +available; a sparrow often making it possible +to annoy even a duck out of her +share of cracked corn. Ranged along a +brown-draped oak branch in the waxing +light, crows show a lordly glistening of +feathers. (Sun on a sweeping wing in +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>flight has the quality of sun on a ripple.) +Where hemlocks gather, deep in somber +woods, the great horned owl has thus soon, +perhaps working amid snows at her task, +built a nest wherein March will find sturdy +balls of fluff. The thunderous love song +of her mate sounds through the timber. +By the time the wren has nested these +winter babies will be solemn with the +wisdom of their famous race.</p> + +<p>There is no season like the end of February +for cleaning out brooks. Hastening +yellow waters toss a dreary wreckage of +torn or ashen leaves, twigs, acorn cups, +stranded rafts of bark, and buttonballs +from the sycamore, never to come to seed. +Standing on one bank or both, according +to the sundering flood’s ambition, the +knight with staff and bold forefinger sets +the water princess free. She goes then +curtsying and dimpling over the shining +gravel, sliding from beneath the ice that +roofs her on the uplands down to the softer +valleys, where her quickened step will be +heard by the frogs in their mansions of +mud, and the fish, recluses in rayless pools, +will rise to the light she brings.</p> + +<p>Down from the frozen mountains, in +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>summer, birds and winds must bear the +seed of alpine flowers—lilies that lean +against unmelting snows, poppies, bright-colored +herbs, and the palely gleaming, +fringed beauties that change names with +countries. How just and reasonable it +would seem to be that flowers which edge +the ice in July should consent to bloom +in lowlands no colder in February! The +pageant of blue, magenta, and scarlet on +the austere upper slopes of the Rockies, +where nights are bitter to the summer +wanderer—why should it not flourish to +leeward of a valley barn in months when +icicles hang from the eaves in this tamer +setting? But no. Mountain tempests are +endurable to the silken-petaled. The +treacherous lowland winter, with its coaxing +suns followed by roaring desolation, +is for blooms bred in a different tradition.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 366px;"><a name="The_Powers_of_Light" id="The_Powers_of_Light"></a> +<img src="images/illo_010.jpg" width="366" height="488" alt="The Powers of Light" title="The Powers of Light" /> +</div> + +<p>The light is clear but hesitant, a delicate +wine, by no means the mighty vintage of +April. February has no intoxication; the +vague eagerness that gives the air a pulse +where fields lie voiceless comes from the +secret stirring of imprisoned life. Spring +and sunrise are forever miracles, but the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>early hour of the wonder hardly hints the +exuberance of its fulfillment. Even the +forest dwellers move gravely, thankful for +any promise of kindness from the lord of +day as he hangs above a sea-gray landscape, +but knowing well that their long +duress is not yet to end. Deer pathetically +haunt the outskirts of farms, gazing +upon cattle feeding in winter pasture from +the stack, and often, after dark, clearing +the fences and robbing the same disheveled +storehouse. Not a chipmunk +winks from the top rail. The woodchuck, +after his single expeditionary effort on +Candlemas, which he is obliged to make +for mankind’s enlightenment, has retired +without being seen, in sunshine or shadow, +and has not the slightest intention of disturbing +himself just yet. Though snowdrops +may feel uneasy, he knows too much +about the Ides of March! Quietest of all +Northern woods creatures, the otter slides +from one ice-hung waterfall to the next. +The solitary scamperer left is the cottontail, +appealing because he is the most +pursued and politest of the furry; faithfully +trying to give no offense, except when +starvation points to winter cabbage, he is +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>none the less fey. So is the mink, though +he moves like a phantom.</p> + +<p>Mosses, whereon March in coming treads +first, show one hue brighter in the swamps. +Pussy willows have made a gray dawn in +viny caverns where the day’s own dawn +looks in but faintly, and the flushing of +the red willow betrays reveries of a not +impossible cowslip upon the bank beneath. +The blue jay has mentioned it in the course +of his voluble recollections. He is unwilling +to prophesy arbutus, but he will just +hint that when the leaves in the wood lot +show through snow as early as this ... +Once he found a hepatica bud the last day +of February ... Speaking with his old +friend, the muskrat, last week ... And +when you can see red pebbles in the creek +at five o’clock in the afternoon ... But +it is no use to expect yellow orchids on the +west knoll this spring, for some people +found them there last year, and after that +you might as well ... Of course cowslips +beside red willows are remarkably pretty, +just as blue jays in a cedar with blue berries.... +He is interminable, but then he has seen +a great deal of life. And February needs her +blue jays’ unwearied and conquering faith.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 344px;"> +<img src="images/illo_013.jpg" width="344" height="205" alt="Chapter III" title="Chapter III" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.<br /> + +WAYS OF THE MARCH HARE</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_f.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="F" title="F" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">F</span>ollow</span> him to the woods +and you know his fascination, +but never give the +March hare a reference for +sobriety. His reputation cannot +be rehabilitated, yet his intimates love +him in spite of it. He is such an accomplished +tease! He wakens, playful and ingratiating, +with the sun; he skips cajolingly +among the crocuses; and before an hour +passes he is rushing about the fields in a +fury, scattering the worn-out, brown grasses, +scaring the first robins, and bouncing +over the garden fence to break the necks of +any tulips deceived by his morning mood. +Impossible animal, he is an eccentric born, +glorying in his queerness; and none the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>less, there are some who think he knows +the zest of life better than April’s infatuated +starling or the woodchuck drowsing +in May clover. He loves to kick the +chilly brooks into foam and fluster them +until they run over their unthawed banks +and tear downhill and through the swamp +to alarm the rivers, so that they, too, come +out on land and the whole world looks as +though it had gone back to the watery +beginning. He chases north the snowy +owl, ornament of our winter woods, and +fraternizes with the sinful sparrow. Shrike +and grosbeak leave, saying that really it +is growing quite warm, and, glancing behind +them, they behold the March hare +turning somersaults in snowdrifts. He +freezes the mud that the shore lark was +enjoying. No one depends upon him. +Yet, to see swift and enchanting changes +of sky, lake, and woodland, go forth with +the March hare and find with him, better +than quiet, the earth astir.</p> + +<p>Trees lose the archaic outline as leaf +buds swell. Reddened maples and black +ash twigs, yellow flowers on the willow, +begin the coloring of a landscape that will +not fade to gray and dun again until +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>December comes. The lilacs are growing +impatient, for already the sophisticated +city lilac bush is wearing costly bloom, +careless that a debut made so early early +ends. The crocuses, spring’s opening ballet, +dressed in pastel tints, take their places +on the lawn, standing delicately erect, +waiting for bird music. Unknown to +March’s gales, the still swamp pools are +fringed with shooting green, full of hints +of cowslips; and arbutus—few know on +what hillsides—is lifting the warm leaf +blanket, trusting that vandal admirers are +far away. The March violet is sung more +than seen, visiting Northern slopes and +woods hollows only by caprice, but all the +legends lingering over it, and the magic +beauty it gives to maidens who gather it +at dawn, make the violet still, for lyrical +needs, the flower of March. Cuddled close +to sun-warmed stones, cloaked by quaint +leaves lined with sapphire and maroon, +sometimes now the hepatica has come; and +bloodroot nested under bowlders, and in +fence corners where the sun is faithful, lifts +praying, exquisite petals that open swiftly +from the slim bud and are scattered by a +touch. The dark blue grape hyacinth +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>stands calm in winds and bitter weather; +waist-deep in snow, it proudly holds its +ground. Sap is visibly climbing to the +highest limbs. It seems even to be +mounting in the ancient wild-grape vines +that swing from the roof of the wood, +bearing no buds and looking dead a hundred +years, though there is life beneath +the somber and shaggy bark. Sap called +back through the ducts of the winter-warped +thorn, solitary in the clearing +where the cruel nor’easter raced, will +cover the sad branches, once the soft +days are here, with shining blossoms. The +year turns when the sap runs. Little boys +who have their sugar maples picked out +and under guard, being more forehanded +about some things than others, are whittling +intensely.</p> + +<p>Loneliest of all sounds, the “peepers” +take up their forsaken song in flooded +meadows, silenced in ghostly fashion by a +footstep that comes near. Heartbroken +chant, it is more elegy than spring song, +hard to hear at dusk, yet it is certain that +those peepers are delighted that March +is here—as content with their fate, while +they utter the poignant notes, as the emphatic +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>old frogs by the deeper water. +Wander-birds, almost unresting, are posting +north again through the twilights. +Bold wild geese are awing for Canada. +Quiet returning hawks cross the valleys, +and the pine grosbeak hastens past. +Spring dowers the devoted but undesired +starling with a pleasant voice which will +change by summer into an exasperating +croak, and so many of our birds suffer this +unfair loss that a feathered critic would +have good reason to declare that poets +ought to be slain in youth. The terrifying +little screech owl wails from shadowy +woods, and from the venerable timber +sounds the horned owl’s obscure threat. +The chickadee repeats with natural pride +his charming repertoire of two notes—“Spring +soon!” Nothing is refused this +fortunate one, born with a sweet disposition +and a winsome song, while sparrows, +angrily conducting their courtships, remain +on earth solely by dint of original +cleverness.</p> + +<p>Meadow mole and turtle, woodchuck +and chipmunk, are recovering from a three +months’ nap, waiting patiently in the sunshine +for the season to begin. Snakes +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>come out with the rest of the yawning +company. Fish glitter again in the hurrying +streams, building their nests and houses +like the others—often obeying a spring +impulse to rush from lake to outlet or +from quiet water to streamhead, ending +their journey suddenly and forever amid +wire meshes. The brooks are icy on the +mildest days with melted snow from the +mountains, where hemlocks green as arctic +waters, shutting out the sun, keep a white +floor long after the valley wears grasses.</p> + +<p>Whoever has a touch of madness to +lend him sympathy with the March hare +likes the bewildering days through which +he scampers to vanish at the edge of April. +Rebellious, whitening ponds and wind-bent +trees; defiant buds and all the kindled +life of marsh, hill, and woodland, set free +once more from cold, but not from dread—hear +at the coming of the mighty month +their promise of release. But only to +comrades who will run with him through +muddy lanes and tangled brush does he +show his treasures: forest creatures sped +like the couriers, petals lifted like the +banners, of life resurgent.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 342px;"> +<img src="images/illo_019.jpg" width="342" height="251" alt="Chapter IV" title="Chapter IV" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.<br /> + +THE APRIL MOMENT</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_s.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="S" title="S" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">S</span>urvivor</span> of so much that +her fear is gone, triumphant +April answers the dark +powers as if they could never +speak again. Spring after +spring she stands among flying petals and +smiles at the last bitter winds. She will +not grant that the green earth was ever +vanquished, fiercely alive as now it is. +Scornfully the new silver bloom on the +clover sheds the relentless rain. Undaunted, +reaffirming, she summons all +beauty of color, music, and fragrance beneath +her banners, with a vitality so profound +and impregnable that more than +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>other months she is careless of man’s +sympathy. April, preoccupied, hastens +from crumbling furrow to meadows that +shout the coming of the green. Intense +and too eager for tenderness, she craves +no admiration. Quite without excuse, the +song sparrow sits on a wine-colored willow +twig and sings frantically. Anyone has +as good a reason for ecstasy as he—merely +that the dumb struggle is ended and the +long suns have returned in splendor.</p> + +<p>Contemplative between their dark exotic +leaves, dogtooth violets fill the light-flecked +hollows. Spring beauties open +warily at daybreak to show stamens of +deep rose. Where imperious amber waters +go foaming through the swamp, spendthrift +gold of cowslips is swept down to +the rivers, and budded branches that +leaned too close above the ripple are shut +out from the sun world for a while. Mauve +and canary slippers are waiting for the +fairy queen where our wild orchid of the +North dangles them on remote knolls, but +they are usually found and borne off by +some one for whom they are in no way +suitable. Translucent young leaves glitter +beside the stream’s path. Dandelion rosettes +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>appear with serene impartiality on +guarded lawn and mountain pasture, where +steal also the polite but persistent “pussy +tiptoes,” asserting the right to display +white leaves in spring, if so a plant should +choose. The snail has deserted his shell +and gone forth to take the air at the risk +of being plowed under. None of April’s +children remember or foresee. The vivid +present is enough.</p> + +<p>The apple boughs are inlaid with coral. +The peach is a cloud of dawn, and petals +of the forward cherry and pear are floating +reluctantly down. Wild-fruit trees, mysteriously +planted, are misty white above +the woodland thicket—scented crabapple +and twisted branch of plum. This is the +month of blossoms, as May is the month +of shimmering leaves and June of the +fruitless flower.</p> + +<p>The blackbird swings at the foamy crest +of the haw, disturbed by a thousand delights, +and notes too few to tell them. +The crow hoarsely mentions his rapture +as he flaps above the moving harrow, and +the new lambs look on in a tremulous, +wounded manner while the famished woodchuck +makes away with the cloverheads +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>they were just about to endeavor to bite +off. Uncertainly the wondering calves +proceed about the pasture, not yet at the +stage in life where they will skip with +touching curiosity after every object that +stirs. At dusk and glistening morning +there are bird songs such as only April +hears—the outburst of welcome to the +light, and the sleepy fluting of the robins +when the sky turns to a soft prism in the +west. Fainter, more melancholy even +than in March, is the twilight lament of +the peepers. They are alien to the aria +of April.</p> + +<p>New England’s forget-me-nots are fleet +turquoise in the grasses; New England’s +arbutus flowers lie flushed pearls among +the ancient leaves; but everywhere are the +violets of three colors—yellow for the pool’s +edge, white among the bog lands, and blue +as pervasive as the sunlight on hill slope, +road bank, and forest floor. And there +are violets of an unfathomable blue, +sprinkled with white like wisps of cloud +against far mountains. Some grow close +to earth, taught by past dismay; others, +long-stemmed and sweet, will live and +suffer and mend their ways next year. +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>The windflower meets the breeze, a slim +princess, incredibly fragile, yet broken less +easily than the strong tulip, vaguely +touched with rose or white as bloodroot. +Tulips dwell not only on the ground; they +have parted great, opaque petals at the +tops of trees, startling to see in the leafless +wood. Watercress glitters in the cold +streams where trout, winter-weary, are on +patrol for those flies now magnificent in +their jeweled dress of spring. The first oak +leaves are delicately crimson at the end +of the bough. Disregard, amid this pageantry +of <i>la vita nuova</i>, the outrageous +satire of brown skeleton “fingers” that +point stiffly up through the shining blades +of grass. If they seem to be a chilling +cynicism of Nature, who has not found an +April dandelion telling a braver story +through winter snow?</p> + +<p>Cedar and balsam twig are golden-tipped. +Nothing is unchanged. Immortal +wings that beat through February +gales to reach this land of their tradition +are fluttering now about the building of +the nest. The smooth chimney swift +flashes above the barn and is gone. With +drooping wings he hangs poised against +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>the daffodil sky in his evening play. +Peaceably among the lilacs the contented +bluebird sits, though through bulb, root, +and chrysalis has passed the irresistible +current that will let no sharer of the earth +be still—not stone nor seed nor man. Into +this forced march April steps with gladness, +hailing the order, predestined to +change. Joining her unresisting, take for +your own the moment of escape which the +singer in the blossoms freely claims. Life’s +fullness is measured by these salvaged +April moments when suddenly joy becomes +a simple and close-dwelling thing, +when for a merciful, lighted instant the +impersonal and endless beauty of the +world seems enough.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 341px;"> +<img src="images/illo_025.jpg" width="341" height="202" alt="Chapter V" title="Chapter V" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.<br /> + +THE CREST OF SPRING</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_f.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="F" title="F" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">F</span>lickering</span> soft leaves +spangled with sunlit rain +give May a robe diamond-sown, +as lighted spray may +weave for the sea. Skimming +wings catch sunrise colors. The +grass blade is borne down by the exquisite +burden of one translucent pearl. This is +the luminous youth of the year, and its +splendor lies deeper than the glitter of +dew-and-rain jewels, for it is visible in the +forbidding strongholds of hemlock and +pine, where a sunless world still shines with +May. In one month only Nature lights +her unquenchable lamp. Look down upon +the orchard from a hill: the young leaves +are lanterns of sheer green silk, not the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>richly draped and shadowy foliage of full +summer. Lustrous is the new red of +poison ivy and woodbine, of swamp +maple and slowly budding oak. Where +in July the hard light will play as upon +metal, lake and stream are faintly shimmering +gray. Rain cannot dim the radiant +freshness, for trees thus queenly +clothed in blossoms never bend submissive +to the pelting skies. Let that fragment +of creation which bears umbrellas prostrate +its spirit before the “blossom storm,” +seven times renewed—the answer of the +flowered thorn is always exultant. Amid +departing petals which have played their +role and gone, voyaging on raindrops, “the +May month flaps its glad green leaves like +wings.”</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 367px;"><a name="The_Fairies_Sleep" id="The_Fairies_Sleep"></a> +<img src="images/illo_026.jpg" width="367" height="515" alt="On the Topmost Boughs the Fairies Sleep" title="On the Topmost Boughs the Fairies Sleep" /> +</div> + +<p>Wild shrubs upon the mountain slopes +are in thronging bloom. Delicately pink +and nectar-laden, the prodigal azalea calls +to the honeybees, always bitterly industrious +and severely intent upon duty amid +a general festival. It is a great satisfaction +sometimes to find a bee overtaken by intoxication +and night within a water lily +or hollyhock, his obtrusive good example +smothered sweetly. For once he was not +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>at the hive in time to murmur of his +heavy day of posting from garden to +meadow! Dowered with a white simplicity +beyond the pensive moonflower’s, +the bracts of the dogwood seem afloat +among gray branches—misty, seen far off; +clear cut to nearer view; eloquent of spring; +without fragrance as without pretense. +The mountain laurel holds above gleaming +leaves its marvelously carven cups, +faint pink or white, amber-flecked. All +winter it has kept the green, when ground +pine lay snowbound and spruces sagged +with sleet. The victor may find his wreath +at any time of year, for our laurel has it +ready. High toward the stars in regal +manner the tulip trees lift their broader +chalices. It is probably in these, on the +topmost boughs, that the fairies sleep +where mortals never climb up to look in. +Bilberry, shadbush, and brier stand in +May marriage robes of white, quiet and +beautiful, scented at dusk when the sun +warmth begins to leave the blossoms. +The red haw wears a little fine golden lace. +Farther south the rhododendron is gorgeously +displayed—magenta verging on +damson.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>The air is precious with the plentiful +sweetness of lilac and magnolia, of the +memorial lavender lilac that summons +homesickness to city parks on evenings of +May. The carmine glow of the flowering +quince is here, brought from its tropic +wilderness. The long flushed curve of the +almond spray bends meekly toward the +sod. Opulent is every bush, though its +blossoming may be secret. In colors beloved +of kings, the velvet, minutely perfect +iris commands the garden path. Beside +it in despair the old-time bleeding-heart +laments, and the bells of the valley lily +hang, chiming fragrance. Impatient climb +the red-stalked peonies. The currant is +in green but pleadingly sweet blossom.</p> + +<p>High, thick grass and clover in May +fields are only the setting for the dazzling +buttercup, who shakes the dews from her +closed petals before daybreak and folds +them prayerfully at about the time the +birds turn home. First white daisies, +supremely fresh and lucid as all May’s +glories are, show a few misleading foam +flecks of the flood with which they intend +to overwhelm the crop of hay. Feathery +yellow of the wild mustard nods beside +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>the road as if it were not anchored to immovable +roots. Already the sapphire star +grass is hiding in the meadows. Gone +are the blossoms of the wild strawberry. +The canary-colored five-finger vine would +lace itself over the world, given but half +an opportunity. So would the bramble +of the fair white blossom and maroon-bordered +leaf.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 366px;"><a name="Coming_Summer" id="Coming_Summer"></a> +<img src="images/illo_028.jpg" width="366" height="578" alt="The Rejoicing Shout of Coming Summer" title="The Rejoicing Shout of Coming Summer" /> +</div> + +<p>Still are restless wings now upon the +guarded nest. Some flash along the turned +furrow, circle near the eaves, dip sharply +to the ripple. Willow fronds are startled +by the glinting blue of the kingfisher, +scarlet of the tanager. Once more the +chimneys of old houses know the flickering +swallow. The oriole has come to the +orchard again, the wren to the grape +arbor. Tiny rabbits, beholding for the +first time what white clover can be, twitch +their noses in content. Tired children, +returning from rifled woodlands with too +many posies, drop them in the path, like +flower girls intrusted to strew the way of +summer. It is more comfortable not to +grant flowers the capacity for pain, but we +demand, nevertheless, that they enjoy giving +pleasure to us, so doubtless they are +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>glad to be of service even in this thwarted +fashion. Yet May’s store is manifold; her +waiting buds can replace the scattered ones.</p> + +<p>The face of Nature wears in the shining +month a beauty something less than +mature, but more than the mischief and +troubling intensity of April. The wonder +of the hour—the adieu of spring and the rejoicing +shout of coming summer—dwells +there, a subdued, impassioned note. The +crest of the year’s youth merges like all +crests into the wave beyond, renewed forever +like the waves. To man alone has +been given the difficult task of keeping on +without a spring. That singular adversity +is ours in common with inanimate things: +May rose and lilac come back each year +to the forsaken house, but to the house +May brings no change. About it a world +of snow becomes a world of blossoms, as +for us, and the sun creates. But the house +needs aid of human hands, man of earth’s +quickened beauty in luminous May.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 343px;"> +<img src="images/illo_031.jpg" width="343" height="251" alt="Chapter VI" title="Chapter VI" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.<br /> + +HAY HARVEST TIME</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 98px;"> +<img src="images/initial_b.jpg" width="98" height="110" alt="B" title="B" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">B</span>y</span> the manifold hayfields only, +were her wild-rose token banished, +a traveler returning +from another land to our +June, not knowing the time +of year, might name the month. In days +just before hay harvest the glistening +dance of meadow grasses is most splendid, +their soft obedience to the winds is +readiest. Deep rose plumes of sorrel, the +wine-colored red-top, smoky heads of timothy, +are forever aripple, and, though +overstrewn with flowers, they reveal when +bent beneath the step of the southwest +breeze a thousand lowlier flowers near the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>roots. Here the “wild morning-glory,” +the tiny fields convolvulus, hides perilously +in the mowing; white clover and yellow +five-finger are spread; the grassflower holds +up its single jewel. The swaying stems +are trellises to many a wandering vine; +there are fairy arbors where a tired elf +might sleep guarded from the sun as well +as in a jungle. Here, too, the wild strawberries +are ripening, not breathing yet the +bouquet of July; but the white wild strawberry, +lover of the shades, has already +reached its pallid ripeness. Far beneath +the moving surface of the grass ocean lies +a dim and mysterious world, lined with +track and countertrack of the beetle, +caverns of the mole, and the unremaining +castle of the ant. Here the sleek woodchuck +passes imperceptibly, the ingenuous +cottontail finds his brief paradise; small +moths fold their wings and sleep.</p> + +<p>Above are light, motion, and the clearest, +strongest colors of the year, untarnished +by hot suns, unmixed with the later +browns. The dark-eyed yellow daisy, sun +worshiper, rises amid the fresh brilliance +of that other starry-petaled weed which +only sheep will eat. Celestial-blue chicory +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>wanders in from the roadside and will not +thereafter be denied. Yarrow with its +balsam fragrance and fernlike leaf, the +first delicate wild carrot asway, goldfinch +yellow of the moth mullein, cloverheads of +the Tyrian dye, sunny spray of mustard, lie +scattered on the crests of hayfield waves.</p> + +<p>In the lowgrounds, on bowldered hillsides, +far in the woods, wherever the mowing +machine will grant it a summer, +spreads the exquisite wild rose, dowered +like other flowers of June—the water +lily, the wild-grape blossom, the syringa—with +a perfume as wistfully sweet as the +form and hue of its chalice. That fragrance, +unearthly, never fails to bring a +catch of the breath, a start of memory, +when in whatever place it is encountered +again. You seldom find a wild rose withered; +they cast their petals down without +a struggle, and a throng of ardent pink +buds are waiting on the bush. So it is +with the water lily—when the hour strikes +she draws her green cloak once more about +her and retires from the sun.</p> + +<p>The meadow rue has shaken out veil +upon floating veil in the woodlands. The +shaded knolls are sprinkled lavender with +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>wild geraniums, willing to be background +for the May windflower or the buttercups +of June. Among the rocks, twinkling red +and yellow in the sandy, sunny places, +the columbine swings her cups of honey +impartially for glittering humming bird +and blunt-nosed, serious bee. Columbines +are delicious—could anyone regard them +sensibly, and not as something animate +and almost winged. The claret-colored +milkweed (a natural paradox) holds flowing +nectar, too, but there is a paler milkweed, +so softly tinted of pink, yellow, and +white as to be no color at all, whereto the +little yellow butterflies drift to sip at dusk. +The blossomed elder rests like white fog +in the hollows, scenting all the country +ways and promising elder-blossom wine, +the dryad’s draught. In moist and dark +retreats—under hemlocks and at the doors +of caves—the ghost lamp is lighted. In +the brightest spot it can find the small +blackberry lily paints against the ledge +its speckled orange star.</p> + +<p>It is the time of perfect ferns, uncurled +quickly from the brown balls, and making +our Northern woods tropical with the +sumptuous brake and temperate imitations +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>of the tree fern. They fill the glades +and scale the cliffs. They mingle enchantingly +along creeks and at the edge of the +pond with the regal hosts of the blue +flag—the lavishly sown iris of the meadows. +They are matted close in the swamps, +plumy on the hilltops. From mosses on +old logs spring ferns almost as faery as the +fronds of the moss itself.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 372px;"><a name="The_Swooping_Bat" id="The_Swooping_Bat"></a> +<img src="images/illo_034.jpg" width="372" height="610" alt="The Swooping Bat Darts Noiselessly" title="The Swooping Bat Darts Noiselessly" /> +</div> + +<p>Into the whispering twilight of June come +many creatures to play strange games and +sing such songs as even the many-stringed +orchestra of the sunlit hayfield does not +know. The swooping bat darts from thick-hung +woodbine and noiselessly crosses +the garden, brushes the hollyhocks, and +speeds toward the moon. Moths, white +and pallid green, wander like spirits +among the peonies. Sometimes the humming +bird shakes the trumpet vine in the +dark, queerly restless, though he is Apollo’s +acolyte. The fireflies are lambently +awing. The cricket’s pleading, interrupted +song is half silenced by the steady, hot +throb of the locust’s. The tree toad’s +eerie note comes faint and sweet, but from +what cranny of the bark he only knows. +The mother bird, guardian even in sleep, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>speaks drowsily to her children. From +the brooding timber the owl sends his call +of despair across acres of friendly fields +placid in the dew. June nights are wakeful. +Then enchantment deepens, for there +comes no pause in darkness for the joy +of earth.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 344px;"> +<img src="images/illo_037.jpg" width="344" height="251" alt="Chapter VII" title="Chapter VII" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.<br /> + +THE MONTH OF YELLOW +FLOWERS</h2> + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_f.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="F" title="F" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">F</span>rom</span> valley after valley dies +away the drowsy croon of +the mowing machine, leaving +to the grasshoppers the fragrant +drying hay. Now +comes July in many hues of yellow, spreading +her gold beside dark, +backwaters and along the sun-warmed +stubble, whose various, singing life is +loudest through these shimmering afternoons. +Tawny beauties are abroad in +woodways and sea marshes. Where the +hot air shines and quivers over shallow +pools yellow water lilies float sleepily beneath +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>curved canopies, while the lucent +pallors of the white water lily one by one +are dimmed. Moving serenely toward its +climax, the season drinks the sun and takes +the color of its slanting light.</p> + +<p>The flame lily lifts a burnt-orange cup +straight toward the sky. The yellow +meadow lily bends down over the damp +mold it seeks. But both love deep woods, +and, blazing suddenly above a fern bed, +the rich flowers startle, like a butterfly +of the Andes adrift in Canadian forests. +They are princesses of the tropics, incongruously +banished to Northern swamps, +but scornfully at ease. The false Solomon’s-seal +in proud assemblies wears +with an oddly holiday air its freckled +coral beads, always a lure to the errant +cow; and jack-in-the-pulpit, having been +invested with some churchly rank which +demands the red robe, is ready to cast +off his cassock of lustrous striped green +for one of scarlet. The pendent-flowered +jewelweed, plant with temperament and +therefore called, too, touch-me-not, droops +its dew-lined leaves along the traveled +lanes, for it is making ready small surprise +packages of seed that snap ferociously open +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>at a touch; and thus intriguing every +passer-by into sowing its crop, it earns +the name unfairly borne by the innocent +yellow toadflax—snapdragon, which snaps +only at bumblebees.</p> + +<p>Gayly in possession of the fields, black-eyed +Susan, known to the farmer as “that +confounded yellow bull’s-eye,” is holding +her own, prepared to resist to the utmost +the onslaught of the goldenrod, which +presumes to unfurl in summer the banners +of fall. The clear yellow evening primrose, +scion of one of our very best old +English families, associates democratically +with a peasant mullein stalk, canary-flecked, +since they both fancy sun and +sand. Magnificent sometimes upon the +sand banks rises a clump of that copper-in-the-sunshine +flower, the butterfly weed, +soon to become as fugitive as our fair, lost +trailing arbutus, the cardinal, and the +fringed gentian, if its lovers do not woo +it less selfishly. All beauty refuses captivity. +In upland meadows the orange +hawkweed is afoot, waving its delirious-colored +“paint brush” wantonly amid the +pasture grass in the light hours, but folding +it at sunset, no sipper of the dews. Brook +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>sunflowers have come to the edge of the +stream, but not to look into the waters; +their sunward-gazing petals are delicately +scented, surpassing their sisters of the +fenced garden. The half-tamed tiger lily, +haunter of deserted dooryards and faithful +even to abandoned mountain farms long +since given over to the wildcat and the +owl, wanderer by dusty roadsides, offers +each morning new buds, and by twilight +they have bloomed and withered. Like +the May rose, this is an elegiac flower, +clinging to lost gardens when all the rest +have vanished, though patches of tansy, +herb of witchlore, will show pungent +golden buttons for long years untended, +let the forgotten gardener but plant it +once. How many a little cabin, built in +eagerness and hope, is remembered at last +only by the tiger lily, May rose, and chimney +swift! Yellow sweet clover, catching +a roothold anywhere, declaring the gravel +bed a garden, makes it happiness to breathe +the entranced air. The yellow butterflies, +like leaves of autumn, tremble and flurry +where the sun-steeped field meets the +sweet dark wood. Among the rocks gleam +ebony seeds of the blackberry lily, whose +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>star of orange and umber is about to +set.</p> + +<p>Who knows, besides the birds, that embroidered +on the moss new scarlet partridge +berries are ripe, hung from the +vagrant vine of pale-veined leaf that does +not fear the snow? Only a month ago in +this fairy greenery lay the furry white +partridge blossom, almost invisible, but +with a fragrance like that of just-opened +water lilies, and now the green fruit colors +to the Christmas hue. There are no +flowers like these. The wood fairies wear +them with their gowns of spangled cobweb +trimmed with moonlight.</p> + +<p>Bough apples, with a sweetness like that +of flowers distilled by the intense sun, +show the first brown seeds. From the +high-piled loads of hay journeying slowly +to the mow fall the dried buttercups and +daisies that danced in the mowing grass. +Ceaseless are locusts; heavy is the air above +the garden, where phlox and strawberry +shrub tinge it Persian-sweet. Clustered +blueberries are drooped upon the mountains, +and in the swamps, sometimes over +quicksands, shows the darkling sheen of +the high-bush huckleberry. The odor of +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>the balsam fir is drawn out and spread far +by the heat. Now the pursued brambles +become the blackberry patch. The waste +lands shine yellow with the blooms of the +marching hardhack. It is the triumph of +the sun, and his priest, the white day lily +of the cloistral leaf, worships in fragrance.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 347px;"> +<img src="images/illo_043.jpg" width="347" height="239" alt="Chapter VIII" title="Chapter VIII" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.<br /> + +THE MOOD OF AUGUST</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 96px;"> +<img src="images/initial_t.jpg" width="96" height="110" alt="T" title="T" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">T</span>he</span> wild cherries are no longer +garnet; they have darkened +to their harvest and hang in +somber ripeness from the +twig. Drowsy lie the grain +fields and slowly purpling vineyards. The +robin in the apple orchard is hardly to be +seen among the red-fruited boughs from +which the first Astrakhans are dropping. +Days of uncertain suns and exultant growing +are over. A languorous pause has come +to the year. Even the crows, flapping away +across the windy blue, caw in a sleepy +fashion, not yet hoarse with anxiety because +the huskers are hurrying the corn +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>to cover with that penurious vigilance +which a crow finds so objectionable. The +rabbits, scampering and wary in the new +clover time, sit out in the hot sun a good +deal now, like convalescent patients; they +will keep this up until the faint noons of +November, storing the warmth that lets +them sleep, come winter, through many a +hunting party overhead. The woodpecker +knocks with less ferocity. Stately on his +favorite dead branch at the lake’s edge the +blue-armored kingfisher sits to watch the +ripple. Only the grasshopper persists with +tragical intensity in his futile rehearsal for +the role of humming bird. A satirical +Italian compares man to the grasshopper, +but no man is capable of such devotion +to baffled aspirations. Practice in grace +makes him more and more imperfect. +Young wood duck, with portentous dignity, +follow their mother down the topaz creek +in single file, an attentive field class, observing +the demented lucky bugs, the red-lined +lily pads of the coves, the turtles sound +asleep on the warm stones. For the wood’s +feathered children this is no month of play +and slumber; it will soon be autumn, and +they must attempt the long flight.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>The aspect of the buckwheat fields is +August’s signet. From their goldenrod +borders reaches a world of happy whiteness, +against sky the color of the pickerelweed +flower, waving softly, shadowed only +by the plumy clouds. The corn is out in +topgallant, and if you look from a mountain +path into the planted valley, the écru +tassels have hidden the lustrous ribbon +leaves. Cornfields are never silent. Always +there is a low swish, like that of +little summer waves on a lake shore.</p> + +<p>Lavender and purple thistles, brimmed +with nectar, are besought by imperious +bees and the great blue-black butterfly, +but already their pale-lit ships drift, unreturning, +under sealed orders, to some far +harbor in the port of spring. More silvery +still, the milkweed is adrift. Fleets of +white butterflies rise and fall with the sunset +breeze, and slow, twilight moths come +from under the brakes at the hour of dew. +White-flowered, the clematis and wild cucumber, +the creamy honeysuckle of the +amorous fragrance, cover fence rail and +stone wall, give petals to the barren underbrush, +twine fearlessly around barbed wire, +and festoon deserted barns. Healing herbs +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>of long ago that once were hung every fall +from attic rafters—the “wild isep,” or +mountain mint, and the gray-blooming +boneset—stand profuse but unregarded in +the lowgrounds. We buy our magic potions +now. Once they were brewed above +the back log, as occasion came. In ferny +shadows glimmers the ivory Indian pipe. +The wild carrot, with delicate insistence, +takes the field.</p> + +<p>Ironweed of royal purple, maroon-shot, +mingles in illogical harmony with the blue +vervain and magenta trumpet-weeds. The +note makers name over for us a score of +flowers that Shakespeare meant by “long +purples”; but surely he foresaw our +Northern swamps in August, on fire with +those exuberant, torchlike weeds that rise +tall above the bogs and earn, by their +arresting splendor against a crimson sky, +the need of immortality in song. They +bloom before the katydids begin and survive +the first frost. A few violets—a seed +crop, not intended for men’s gaze, and +hidden cautiously beneath the leaves, are +timidly aflower. They will not go unwed, +but would crave to die obscure.</p> + +<p>The last of the new-tasting bough apples +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>lie in the orchard grass. The later apple +trees, like the sunning rabbit and the +thought-worn crow, wait for the harvest +moon. Already the unresting twigs are +preparing their winter mail of cork and +gum, which will not be unfastened by the +fiercest assaults of the sleet. Short-stemmed +flowers have arisen to clothe the +sharp wheat stubble. Along the mountain +road grow vagabond peach trees, to whose +fruit cling eager blue wasps, whose aromatic +gum traps many a climbing robber. +Other wanderers from the tended orchard—cruelly +sour plums and rouge-cheeked +pears—growing among the cornel bushes, +drop down for the field mouse and woodchuck +their harvest of the wilderness. +Some of them, companioned by the faithful +phlox and sunflower, once grew in dooryards +now desolate. The surpassing rose +mallow like sunrise lights the marshes.</p> + +<p>It is not a month of growth. Fruit and +grain are only expanding—weeks ago the +marvel of formation was complete. It is +the time of warm, untroubled slumber that +ends with the reveille of frost.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 342px;"> +<img src="images/illo_048.jpg" width="342" height="244" alt="Chapter IX" title="Chapter IX" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.<br /> + +SUMMER PAUSES</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 108px;"> +<img src="images/initial_w.jpg" width="108" height="110" alt="W" title="W" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">W</span>here</span> the slow creek is putting +out to sea, freighted +with seed and wan leaf, +cardinal-flowers watch the +waters reddened by their +image. Old gold and ocher, the ferns beneath +move listlessly up and down with +the ripple. As spring walks first along +the stream, autumn, too, comes early to +the waterside, to kindle swamp maples +and give the alder colors of onyx. The +lustrous indigo of the silky cornel hangs +there in profusion. Scented white balls +of the river bush have lost their golden +haloes, and even the red-grounded purple +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>of the ironweed is turning umber. The +fruited sweetbrier shows rust. Fall’s ancient +tapestry, the browns of decay worked +over with carmine, olive, maroon, and +buff, is being hung, but where the blue +lobelia is clustered in the lowground summer +pauses. A parting sun catches the +clear yellow of curtsying, transfigured +birch leaves, and looks back, waiting, to +give September’s landscape a hesitant farewell. +It seems early to go. Pickerelweed +is azure still. Among the green bogs +the fragrant lady’s-tresses wear the white +timidity of April, and the three petals of +the enameled arrowhead flower are dusty +with gold. But seeds wrapped up in +brown are scattering. Remembrance +yields to prophecy.</p> + +<p>The harvesters of grain and grass have +gone, and the tinted stubble is full of +crickets and monotonous cicadas. Now +the crumbling furrow is folded back behind +the plow and corn knives are swinging +close to the solemn pumpkins, for in cornfield, +vineyard, and orchard and in the +squirrel’s domain the last harvests of all +are hastening to ripeness as the sunset +chill gives warning of a disaster foretold +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>since August by the katydid. The honey-colored +pippins, cracked and mellow in the +brooding heat, encounter the windfalls of +October’s trees—deepening red, soft yellow, +and polished green. Great, sheltering +leaves are dropping from the burdened +vine. Every breath tells of fruits, drying +herbs, and the late flowers that in deserted +gardens are most pungent in September—marigolds, +tansy, and the cinnamon +pink. Pennyroyal and mint are +betrayed. Thorn apples, not near ripened, +are knocked from the twig by south-bound +birds.</p> + +<p>Still, among wine-colored and vermilion +foliage, the acorn is green, though flushed +wintergreen berry and red-gemmed partridge +vine proclaim autumn along the +forest floor. The auburn splendors are +upon the sumac and the burning-bush of +old-fashioned dooryards, where, too, the +smoke tree holds its haze of seeds. Sometimes +a gentian stands erect among dead +grasses—a slim señora with a fringed mantilla +swirled close about her shoulders in +the chilly dusk. The closed gentian keeps +its darkly impenetrable blue beside the +pink-tipped companion stalks of the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>snake’s-head. Fair are the sheathed berries +of the prickly ash—but daggers to the +taste. Often they grow among wild cherries, +which, juiceless now, are sweet as +dried fruits from Persia. And there are +the black nannyberries with their watermelon +flavor, and the first spicy wild +grapes.</p> + +<p>Immortelles are bleached paper white +on sandy hills. The nightshade holds +berries of three colors, passing from brilliant +green to clouded amber and deep +crimson lake, and still upon it hangs the +mysterious blue blossom, shunned. Dogwood +boughs are gorgeous as a sunset, +and the thick scarlet clusters droop from +the mountain ash. The last humming +birds haunt tanned honeysuckles. Languid, +but clinging yet to the sun world, +the yellow lily dies on weedy streams. If +the all-conquering goldenrod hangs the +way for summer’s passing with the color +of regret, it has made every meadow El +Dorado with its plumes, sprays, clumps, +and spears. Spray upon delicate spray, +the fairy lavender aster has taken possession +of the roadsides and fields, and before +it, far into the shade, goes the white wood +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>aster, mingling with the flamboyant leaves +of dwarf oaks and the glistening red seeds +of the wild turnip. To make September’s +pageant the scented, pale petals of spring, +the drowsy contentedness of summer’s +fulfillment and the Tyrian dyes of fall are +joined.</p> + +<p>The pallid clematis, in flower along rail +fences, still hides the blacksnake, chipmunk, +and red squirrel—sometimes even +the unsylphlike woodchuck—but the +marshes and the branches of the lakeside +pines have felt for days past the brief +touch of many a strange bird’s feet as the +vanguard migrants seek regions of longer +days. Finely dressed visitors have come +to the blue-berried juniper and the monstrous +pokeweed of the terra-cotta stem. +The heron breaks his profound meditation +to engulf a meadow frog, for he will not +leave until the wild geese “with mingled +sound of horn and bells” press south above +the watercourses. Starling and blue jay +stay awhile to oblige with their clatter to +the dawn. The fur has thickened on the +woods creatures.</p> + +<p>The blind might hear September in the +uproarious arguments of the crow, the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>despondent cries of katydid, tree toad, and +hoot owl. In the air is reluctance, pause. +Flaming festoons of woodbine and poison +ivy begarland the stone wall. Summer +cannot wait. Elegiac purples of the aster +beckon, and the butterfly sleeps long upon +the thistle, but she would not go now, in +the month of the first bittersweet and the +last sweet pea.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 342px;"> +<img src="images/illo_054.jpg" width="342" height="267" alt="Chapter X" title="Chapter X" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.<br /> + +WHEN THE OAKS WEAR +DAMSON</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 96px;"> +<img src="images/initial_t.jpg" width="96" height="110" alt="T" title="T" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">T</span>he</span> wild ducks are streaming +south upon their journey of +uncounted days. Resting a +little after sunset upon the +cedar-bordered pond, they +are startled into flight again by some hound +hunting in the night, and with beating +wing and eerie cry go on. The later flying +geese rise clamorous from among the cat-tails, +and in silent haste the blue heron +and the pair of sad old cranes that had +roosted in a dead elm alongshore take the +chill, invisible trail. When day comes in +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>spreading fire the crows will humorously +watch these wander-birds from the forest +edges. They feel no southward impulse. +Circling the clearing, they comment in +uproar upon the most advisable oak for +their afternoon symposium, expand their +polished feathers, and, seated in a derisive +row, caw a farewell to the wader’s long, +departing legs. Now the mountaineer’s +girl, remembering Old World peasant tales +that never have been told her, hurries indoors +at nightfall from the hallooing specter +of the Wild Huntsman in the clouds, who +is but the anxious leader of the flying +wedge.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 365px;"><a name="The_Mountaineers_Girl" id="The_Mountaineers_Girl"></a> +<img src="images/illo_055.jpg" width="365" height="557" alt="Now the Mountaineer’s Girl Hurries Indoors" title="Now the Mountaineer’s Girl Hurries Indoors" /> +</div> + +<p>Buckwheat stubble in October is such +a crimson as no Fiesolan rose garden ever +unfurled. Gray hill slopes of the North +are festal with its color, insistent even +through rains, glowing from rose madder +to maroon. Lower stretches out the pale +yellow of oats stubble, which breaks into +flashing splinters under the noon sun. +The wheat fields show ocher, and darker—burnt +sienna at the roots—lie the reaped +fields of barley. Small rash flowers, fancying +that the ground between the grain +stalks has been cultivated especially for +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>them, now that they see the sun freely +again, put on the petals of spring amid +this fair desolation. Strawberry blossoms, +visibly fey, appear; long-stemmed and +scanty-flowered fall dandelions; an ill-timed +display of April’s buttercups. The +blackberry vines go richly dyed—superb +red-velvet settings for the jewels of frost.</p> + +<p>Down in the valley, through the wood-smoke +haze, move the slow apple wagons +through the lanes. This is appleland. +Northern Spy and Lemon Pippin are ripe +to cracking; Baldwins will be mellow by +Twelfth-night, the russet at Easter. Gorgeous +and ephemeral hangs the Maiden’s +Blush. The strawberry apples are like +embers on the little trees, rubies of the +orchard. Lady Sweets and Dominies are +respectfully being urged into the cellar, +and for those who will pay to learn the +falseness of this world’s shows the freight +cars are receiving Ben Davises. Sheep-noses, +left often on the boughs, will hold +cold nectar after the black frosts have +killed the last marigold. They lie, dull +red, by the orchard fence in the early +snow, their blunt expression revealing no +secrets. You have to know about them. +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>Nothing is more inscrutable than a +sheep-nose.</p> + +<p>Fast above the indigo crests stir the +light clouds, harried by the west wind +whereon the hawk floats across the valley. +In the afternoon October’s lover takes the +hill path, mica-gemmed, that leads between +birches of the translucent yellow +leaf and maples still green but wearing +scarlet woodbine like a gypsy’s sash. For +here the sunset lingers till the stars, though +from the valley’s goblet evening has sipped +the waning sunlight like a clear amber +wine. But take at morning the path +through brown lowgrounds, or close along +the wood where frost sleeps late, for here +that flower of desire, the fringed gentian, +grows. Its blue is less mysterious and +deep than the closed gentian’s, and yet +how many name it the cup of autumn +delight!</p> + +<p>In the woods where leafless boughs give +them blue sky at last are revealed in +quaint perfection the ferneries of the moss: +palm trees towering higher than a snail’s +house, gallant green plumes with cornelians +at the tip, vast tropical forests spreading +for long inches, gray trailing rivers +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>and orange cliffs of lichen, leagues of +delicate jungle lost under a fallen leaf. +A beetle clad in shining mail presses +through the wilderness. A cobalt dragonfly +lights on a shaken palm. Pursuing a +rolling hickory nut, the chipmunk brings +a hurricane—but these are elastic trees.</p> + +<p>That same mischief maker, incurably +curious, chases every stranger, shooting +along the stone wall and pausing to peer +out from the crevices with unregenerate +eyes. The handsome but vain woodpecker +pounds at the grub-dowered tree he has +chosen to persecute. Enormously ingenuous, +the wayside cow lumbers reproachfully +out of the path, knocking the grains +of excellent make-believe coffee from the +withered dock. The drumming of a partridge +in his solitary transport sounds +where reddened dogwood glorifies a clump +of firs. Sometimes the kittle pheasant, +hardly at home in our woods, ducks her +head and vanishes in the briers.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 366px;"><a name="Baldwins_Mellow_by_Twelfth-night" id="Baldwins_Mellow_by_Twelfth-night"></a> +<img src="images/illo_058.jpg" width="366" height="588" alt="Baldwins Mellow by Twelfth-night" title="Baldwins Mellow by Twelfth-night" /> +</div> + +<p>Now the harvest moon, yellower than +the hunter’s moon of ending autumn or +the strawberry moon that looks upon +June’s roses, rises for husking time. It +is the last harvest; when the corn is in, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>winter comes. Piled, tumbling ears, their +grain set in many a curious pattern, go +by to the sorting floor and crib, with +pumpkins, the satraps of New England, +perched in rickety fashion on the gleaming +load. The mountain ash hangs flamboyant +clusters along the road from the +field. Obedient to the frost, the acorns +are dropping, and the first chestnuts lie, +polished mahogany, in the whitened grass +at sunrise. The shagbark has scattered +its largess, the butternut its dainties in +their staining coats. Against the slopes +the tinted fern patches show bronze, russet, +and pansy brown. Speaking October +and our own purple East, the tall asters, +darkening from lavender to the ultimate +shadowy violet, join the goldenrod. Sumacs +are thronging, with their proudly +blazoned crests; the haw is hung with +Chinese scarlet lanterns; sweetbrier, stem +and leaf, is scented of menthol and spices +of the Orient. The oaks stand regal in +umber and damson. Who that has known +October could ever forget? How quiet the +nights are after frost!</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 338px;"> +<img src="images/illo_060.jpg" width="338" height="171" alt="Chapter XI" title="Chapter XI" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.<br /> + +NOVEMBER TRAITS</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 98px;"> +<img src="images/initial_b.jpg" width="98" height="110" alt="B" title="B" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">B</span>y</span> the time November comes +the year is used to the +caprices of the sun and no +longer frantically brings out +flowers for his gaze or hides +them in hurt surprise from his indifference. +Now the year is resigned, untroubled of +hope, far off from impatient April with +her craving and effort. Experienced +month, November waits ready to face the +snows. She wraps up the buds too +warmly for sleet to pierce their overcoats, +comforts the roots in the woods with mats +of wrecked leaves, spreads a little jewelry +of frost as a warning before the black +frosts come, and for all else lives in the +moment. November has been through +this before. But sometimes, in a reverie, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>she delights the blue jays and persistent +wild asters by a day of Indian summer.</p> + +<p>There has been a great deal of ill feeling +about Indian summer, and the kinder way +is not to persecute those who have since +youth believed and will maintain forever +that it comes in October. Victims of this +perverted fancy, they will go through life +calling the first hot spell after Labor Day +Indian summer. Every fall one explains +to them that this brief season of perfection +may come as late as Thanksgiving, but +the very next year they will be heard to +murmur, under frostless skies, “Well, we +are having our Indian summer.” Let +them go their indoors way, or follow the +deserting robins down to Paraguay! Indian +summer could just as well come when +the oaks have turned forlorn if it wanted +to. In truth, it comes and goes, by no +means exhausted in a solitary burst of +flaring sumacs, fringed gentians lighted by +frost along the rims, damson-colored alder +leaves and old yellow pumpkins, perilously +exposed among forgotten furrows, now that +the corn is being drawn in. It goes, and +comes again, which is its charm—the one +time of year that cannot be calendared.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>There is in all the world a small, choice +coterie of people who like November and +March best of the months, and it must be +admitted that these are often a bit arrogant +about their refined perceptions. They +manage to look down upon the many of +us who prefer the daisy fields to the time +“when hills take on the noble lines of +death.” But whims of the worshiper +steal no splendor from the god. June has +nothing to place beside a moonlit November +night, whose shadow dance of multiform +boughs is never seen through leaves, +while shadows on the snow are hard of +outline, unlike the illusive phantoms running +over autumn’s brown grass. June +has no flowers so quaint, pathetic, and +austere as the trembling weeds of November. +What does the goldenrod, white +with age, care for frost? All winter it will +shake out seeds unthriftily upon the snow, +standing with a calm brotherhood who +have gone beyond dependence on the day. +June’s forests do not take a thousand +colors under a low sun. June’s gray dews +have no magnificence of frost. June’s +incorrigible sparrows are not the brave, +flitting “snowbirds” whose sins we forgive, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>once we hear them chirping in a +blizzard. June is a lyric, November a +hymn.</p> + +<p>The squirrels have put away enough nuts +to last through the holidays, and after +that they come out and get something else—no +one ever knows what. They have +gone off with most of the acorns, leaving +the fairies their usual autumn supply of +cupless saucers. No birds worth fighting +with are left, for the crows will not notice +them, so they go for the chipmunks. +Sometimes at the wood’s edge a bird that +came only with the blossoms and that +should long since have gone sits lost, half +grotesque, on a stark twig—spent and +beautiful singer, belated by perversity or +by untimely faintness of wing! The muskrat’s +winter house is ready, but no happy +quiet such as his good citizenship deserves +is in store for him, because soon the trappers +will begin their patrol of the forest, +and his skin, called wild Patagonian ox, +the exquisite new fur, will bring a good +price. Emotional wild geese still pass +overhead in the dawns and sunsets—the +crows can scarcely conceal their amusement: +“What nonsense, to be always +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>coming or going!” The crow does not remain +in the pale North simply out of devotion +to us. He is above mortal vicissitudes; +behind his demoniac eye dwells a critique +of humanity which he would not be +bothered to utter if he could. The soul +of the satirist once abode in a crow.</p> + +<p>Forsaken nests and rattling reeds along +the stream, pools in the hollows edged +with thin ice, ragged leaves clutched at by +the winds, desperate buds of hepatica and +cowslip where a sloping bank catches +warmth at noon, fences stripped of vines +and ghostly with dead clematis, a few +frozen apples swinging on the top boughs, +trampled fields and pelting rain—and with +it all a grandeur more serene than melancholy. +November’s lovers are not perverse, +declaring this. They see half-indicated +colors and hear low sounds. +They love the mellow light better than +the blaze of rich July, and they are loyal +to November because she speaks in quiet +tones not heard through the eagerness or +snow silence of other months. It is the +sentimentalist who sees only gloom and +the weariness of departure now. November +is ruddier than many a day of spring +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>and the sharp air forbids languor. Indian +summer, her gift and our most fleeting +season, is like the autumn ecstasy of the +partridge, passionate and irresistible, but +not ending in despondency because he +knows it will return, and it is like joy in +that it cannot be foreseen nor detained. +The bacchanal may have dreaded November, +not the dryad.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 340px;"> +<img src="images/illo_066.jpg" width="340" height="243" alt="Chapter XII" title="Chapter XII" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.<br /> + +THE CHRISTMAS WOODS</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 96px;"> +<img src="images/initial_t.jpg" width="96" height="110" alt="T" title="T" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">T</span>he</span> Southern woods hang +their Christmas trimmings +high. Laurel and rhododendron, +mistletoe and holly, +reach up against the walls of +tinted bark. Our Northern forests trail +greens along the floor, and roped ground +pine, pricking through the prone leaves +or a gentle snow, appears as a procession +of tiny palm trees, come North for the +holiday, surprised and lost, but determined +to keep together. Under the haw bushes +and over spruce roots, wherever shade was +thick last summer, partridge vines twine +red-berried wreaths and the little plants +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>of wintergreen flavor and of that wandering +name hold their rubies low on the +mountain side. After the enduring snows +have come, these glimmering fruits will be +requisitioned—dug out by the furry owners +of such plantations on days when even +covered roots seem barren of sap, and nuts +should really be saved awhile longer. +Clumps of sword fern, beaten down by +November rains, are round green mats; +other ferns long ago were brown. But +seldom save in its sunsets and woodlands +has December color. Ponds, fanged +with ice, lie sullen or stir resentfully into +whitecaps. The sky is stony and often +vanishes in brooding fog. Uncloaked, but +courageous in their gray armor, the trees +wait tensely for the intolerable onslaught +of the cold: the blizzard with knives of +sleet.</p> + +<p>Over the marshes at the hour of dusk +when the bronze and topaz are quenched +passes the breath of foreboding. December +acknowledges an unpitying fate—anything +may happen. It is not the fireside +month, softly white outdoors and candlelit +within. Time of miracles, it stands expectant, +and the thronging stars of the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>Christmas midnight wear a restless look. +Rutted paths answer harshly to the step. +Delayed snow is a menace in the air, but +lands beyond the cities would be grateful +should it hasten, bringing safety to the +soil and winter peace. Yet snow is a betrayer, +a sheet of paper upon which the +feet of rabbit, mink, and fox write a guide +to their dwellings and to the whole plan +of their days.</p> + +<p>Snow for Christmas there must be—on +the lighted trees indoors, on our far-scattered, +similar cards. But save as a +convenience to the reindeer and a compliment +to their driver, who cannot create +his stocking stock unless he is snowbound, +and who must feel sadly languid as he +tears through Florida heavens, city people +would quite willingly manage with alum. +Early in school life, however, comes the +dangerous knowledge that nothing is so +easy to draw as Christmas Eve: a white +hillside, a path of one unchanging curve, +a steeple or a chimney with smoke, a fir +tree or a star. Thus snow eases art for +the credulous who think it white. Glittering +under starlight, shadowed with purple, +lemon, or deep blue as sunset turns to +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>evening, taking on daffodil hues at noon, +snow is harder to paint. Fretted with +windy tracery and drawn out into streaming +lines where the gale races along by a +fence, snow is not, on Christmas greetings, +permitted to be seen.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 361px;"><a name="December_Acknowledges_an_Unpitying_Fate" id="December_Acknowledges_an_Unpitying_Fate"></a>December Acknowledges an Unpitying Fate +<img src="images/illo_068.jpg" width="361" height="583" alt="December Acknowledges an Unpitying Fate" title="December Acknowledges an Unpitying Fate" /> +</div> + +<p>The first snowstorm of the year should +be sent from Labrador on Christmas Eve +and sprinkled impartially and ornamentally +over all the land. Then, the Yule +atmosphere once provided, the distribution +should be confined to the rural clientele +until the next December, for on streets +the hoar frost is indeed like ashes. But +why, in somber justice, should the far +South pretend to holiday snow at all? +Why not Christmas cards pranked with +live oaks, alligators, lagoons, and other +beauties of an Everglade scene—an inspiring +escape from tradition and sentiment? +For the antlered steeds must +prance above hibiscus flowers as well as +round the Pole. Yet it must seem dull to +hang stockings by a fireplace that needs +fire merely as a decoration and never to +have loved a sleigh!</p> + +<p>Abandoned, but still no downcast company, +slanting corn shocks not honored +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>with winter shelter stand patient sentinels +in the field. Abandoned they may seem, +yet could you suddenly tip one over there +would be a startled scurrying, for these +are the choice snow-time residences of +field mice, cottontails, weasels, and meadow +moles—not, of course, together in harmony, +but in their separate establishments. +Let the blizzard come; it only +makes warmer a house of cornstalks properly +built, which bears, nevertheless, some +of the dangers of a gingerbread home—passing +cows may feel tempted.</p> + +<p>Vermilion heraldry of the wild rose is +waved undimmed. Witch-hazel with her +yellow blossoms, last flowers of the year, +gazes upon the vanquished shrubs about +her with a smile. Why, she will not even +sow her seed until February! There is +plenty of time for hardy petals.</p> + +<p>Massed against the stern horizon, the +forest stands an unresponsive gray; entered, +the twigs are seen sleek brown, dark +red, and a fawn soft as the tan orchid. +In towns December shows the iron mood. +But in the open places, where pools of +light and shadow lie, it is a water-color +month, made fine with no gorgeous velvets +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>of autumn, but hung with blending veils +of dawn mist and of new snow, so that the +subdued day rises in flushed, drifting +vapors, like April’s awakening, and when +the sun comes, pale, we wonder that there +is no summons in his light.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 341px;"> +<img src="images/illo_072.jpg" width="341" height="246" alt="Chapter XIII" title="Chapter XIII" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.<br /> + +LANDSCAPES SEEN IN +DREAMS</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 96px;"> +<img src="images/initial_t.jpg" width="96" height="110" alt="T" title="T" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">T</span>he</span> painter of landscapes seen +in dreams must be a memory +that knows fantastic woods +and faery seas all strange to +the waking memory. Or else +the artist is only a weariness with the day +just past that gives us in sleep sight of the +country which, so Mr. Maugham and +other story-tellers say, is the real home +that men may go their whole lives long +without finding, because we are not always +born at home, nor even brought up there, +and we might for years be homesick for a +land unseen. Once beheld, the recognition +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>is instant, and in the foreign place begins +a <i>vita nuova</i>—relief and an intensity of +living never known before the new and +familiar harbor came down to meet us at +the shore. So sometimes it is in dreams. +Recurrent and vivid, a scene of sheerest +unreality will take on an earthly air, or +landscapes flamboyantly exotic will hold +the peace denied by every country it has +been our daily fortune to know.</p> + +<p>Dream landscapes come back again and +again, as if they waited there forever, substantial, +and we were the transient comers. +Some, in ether dreams, shrink always from +the same green waves, the same black, +open mine, and two have now and then +been found who saw on sleep journeys +places that words repictured curiously +alike. The fantasies may be patchwork +of poems, plays, and paintings long forgotten, +but when they rise in their compelling +fusion they owe no debt to the +lumber attic of the subconscious. The +world they fashion is their own, and they +do offer by their ethereal pathway a compensation +for the insufficiencies of life.</p> + +<p>There is a long, uncurving sea strand +whose gray immensity of sands lies smooth +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>for miles along the upper beach, but is +feathered near the water by the stroking +of little afterwaves, and draped unendingly +with umber bands of kelp. Here as in +no place seen the seaweed laces are +edged with colors ground in unlighted +depths, as if the tide cast carvings of +lapis lazuli and feldspar up with the argent +pebbles, and all the drifting algæ are incrusted +with yellow shells. Shoreward the +palms climb up until they make a green +horizon, and their unnatural fronds sink +down again like green chiffon that veils +the entrance to the pensive forest. Vines +with scented flowers as intangible as fog +creep over root and trunk, and among them +now and then with soundless foot and +molten eye a leopard winds. Perpetual +sunset wanes and glows behind the palms. +There is never any wind. The violence of +the ocean, the beasts, the tempest, is held +in languorous leash while the treader of the +sands goes on with unfelt steps toward +rocks where the waters break importunate +and sink moaning back. They hang black +above a cave, and waves come in to prowl +and snakes with scales like gems twine +back and forth, glittering in the half light, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>with narcotic and effortless motion, until +they with the rocks and all the scene fade.</p> + +<p>A tiny stream, a pixy’s river, slips from +beneath a bowlder in a wood long known, +and leads through thicket, glade, and clearing +to a terrifying land, desolated by ancient +fires and strewn with blackened +stones and charred boughs. The place +itself is athirst, and the dreamer kneels to +drink. The tiny stream is dark, like a deep +water, and bitter cold as if it flowed +through ice. A staff thrust down cannot +sound its depths. A finger’s span across +and bottomless! Nothing could dam its +flow. Old embers at its borders are suddenly +scattered when a gleaming hand +parts the current and waves back toward +the way just traced, but the flame-blasted +firs have closed behind into a forbidding +wall. Other pallid fingers rise from the +portal of the abyss in warning gesture, but +the narrow gulf opens underfoot.</p> + +<p>There is a town where gay people in +white dress promenade in a plaza shaded +by orange trees, and they are always humming +tunes. Little white streets lead to +shuttered houses. A glory of buginvillæa +overflows trellis and bower in splendid war +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>with the hibiscus hedges and the dropping +yellow fruit. Down the hill and over +cobblestones, pursued by music and laughter, +ministered to by odors of the lemon +blossom, he whom sleep leads here may +go toward a lake of fluent amethyst. The +way is past the market place where brown +women crouch by baskets of brilliant wares +and venders of glistening lizards sit drowsily +bent, and then at a step the forest +dense and brooding is above him and its +low boughs sweep the ripple of the lake. +Immense leaves hang like curtains, and +among them men with unquiet eyes move +and hold monotoned speech while they +hew sparkling rock into monstrous shapes. +They are circling round a pit. They cast +in ornaments of opal and dark gold and +garlands of venomous forest growths, gray +and blood-red, tied with withered vines. +Cries come from the pit, but the chant +never stops.</p> + +<p>Marching from a stronghold far up on +a mountain of cedars, men in mail come +at dusk with standards flickering crimson, +fringed with gold, down to a valley full +of blossomed iris where there is a wide +pool with torches at its rim. Their flare +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>streams out toward the circling cliffs. +Each marcher dips his silken flag into the +quiet waters, and lights rise upon the +battlements above as one by one all the +black plumes are lost in the meadow’s darkness +and the torches burn low and fall +into the pool.</p> + +<p>A garden planted only with dark-red +nasturtiums that lift for the dreamer’s +touch a flower’s velvet cheek lies filmed +with dew and fragrant as a noon breath +from Ceylon spice groves. The miracle of +color is spread along a hillside up to a +high wall of great gray stones, and inside +the gate is a house grown all over with +grapevines, some borne down by blue +clusters with shadowy bloom, some by +clusters of topaz and ripe green. There +is a pond among the grasses, where broad, +wan lilies float, and purple pansies border +all the walks. Very slowly the paneled +door opens and the sun floods the central +hall. It is hung with silver draperies, and +an old woman stands there with a candle, +mumbling and peering in a cataract of +light.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 342px;"> +<img src="images/illo_078.jpg" width="342" height="233" alt="Chapter XIV" title="Chapter XIV" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV.<br /> + +HIDING PLACES</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 95px;"> +<img src="images/initial_c.jpg" width="95" height="110" alt="C" title="C" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">C</span>hildhood</span> remembers a +secret place—refuge, confessional, +and couch of dreams—where +through the years +that bring the first bewildering +hints of creation’s loneliness he goes +to hide and to rebuild the joyous world +that every now and then is laid in flowery +ruins beneath the trampling necessities of +growing up. These little nooks where we +confronted so many puzzles, wondered over +incomprehension, and looked into the hard +eyes of derision, abide caressingly for +memory, who flies to them still from cities +of dreadful light. The need for those +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>small havens is lifelong. They are rarely +at hand in later days, but no locked door +and no walled chamber of the mind can +take their place.</p> + +<p>The suns of midsummer, tempered by +spruce boughs, flicker and play upon a +broad-backed rock where fairy pools made +by the late rain in its crannies are frequented +by waxwing and woodpecker, even +though an intruder sleeps upon that +dryad’s couch. Brakes and sweet fern +crowd around it. Tasseled alders are its +curtains. Here one might be forever at +rest. It is to such a place that rebel +wishes turn when the early grass and clover +thicken in the pastures or when the summer +birds begin their slow recessional. +The longing to lie upon a sun-warmed rock +in the woods comes back desperately in +April and October to them who once have +known that place of healing and stillness.</p> + +<p>Yellow bells from the wands of circling +forsythia bushes drop into a deep hollow +lined with velvet grass. Pale butterflies +of new-come May flutter among the dandelions +that bejewel this emerald cup of Gæa, +and sometimes drowsy wings are folded +sleepily upon a gold rosette. Light beams +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>pass and repass in jubilance over the grass +blades. The sun is enchanted in the clear +yellow of the flowers. Glints, movement, +gayety, and withal peace and silence were +in that place of exultant color and radiant +life. It was a rare spot, and unvisited +save by birds in quest of screening branches +for their nests and perhaps by some one +who hid there and always had to laugh +before he left.</p> + +<p>A round space of soft sward is guarded +by strawberry shrub and by the bridal-wreath +spiræa that droops white branches +lowly to the ground. Here you could lie +on a moonlit summer night, with arms +outstretched and face pressed into the soft +grass, and beneath your fingers you could +feel the world turn on and on, immensely, +soothingly, and everlastingly, the only +sound the bats’ wings above, or a baby +robin protesting musically at the slowness +of the night’s divine pace. Here the smell +of the sod is keen and sweet. Here dew +would cool a throbbing brow. Here the +undertones of earth vibrate through the +body, and all its nerves, strung to intense +perception, yet would be wrapped in persuasive +peace.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>An old balm-o’-Gilead tree, growing on +a hillside, kindly lets down one mighty +limb as pathway to a leafy hiding place +incomparably remote and dimly lighted +even at noon. The branches make an +armchair far back against the trunk, and +that glossy foliage, always cool, swishes +like waves at low tide. The tree has much +to tell, but never an intrusive word. You +may sit there with a book or in the distracting +company of secret happiness or +tears, and it will ignore you courteously, +going on about its daylong task of gathering +greenness from the sun, and only from +time to time touching your hand with an +inquiring leaf. Sometimes a red squirrel +looks in and departs in shocked fashion +through the air. Sometimes the sheep +pass far below on their way home. But +the refuge is secure, and the balm-o’-Gilead’s +cradling arms wait peacefully to +hold an asking child.</p> + +<p>A foamy brown brook that flashes and +dallies, is captured and breaks free again, +down along the mountain has been coaxed +by some wood nymph to furnish sparkling +water for her round rock bath. Dutifully +it pours in every moment its curveting +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>freshness, bringing now and then the tribute +of a laurel leaf or a petal from some +flower that bent too close. This bath is +gemmed with glittering quartz and floored +with red and white pebbles. Gray mosses +broider it where the sun lies, and dark +green where the water drips. The nymph +has been at some pains to train the five-finger +ivy and nightshade heavily all about, +and the great brakes carpet the path her +gleaming feet must tread at sunrise. +Now at noon you may come there, troubling +no living drapery, and dangle your +feet over the moss into the dimpling coolness +of that mountain pool. A trout +might dart in, a red lizard appear upon a +ledge, but nothing else. The wild-cherry +clusters hang within reach.</p> + +<p>In the corner of a meadow where dispassionate +cows graze and snort scornfully +at the collie who comes to get them +in the late afternoon stands a great red +oak that has somehow inspired the grass +underneath it to grow to tropic heights. +But between two of its wandering ancient +roots is short grass, woven with canary-flowered +cinquefoil vines, and into this +nook you may creep, screened by wind-ruffled +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>blades beyond, and taste of the +white wild strawberries that reach their +eerie ripeness in the shade. A woodchuck +may sit up and gaze at you across the +barrier, or a bright-eyed chipmunk scuttle +out on a limb for a better view. They +leave you alone soon, and at twilight even +the cow bell is quiet.</p> + +<p>A balsam fir that grows on a bowlder +leaning out halfway down a ravine hospitably +spreads its aromatic boughs flat upon +the rock, after the inviting manner of this +slumber-giving Northern tree. The very +breath of the hills is shed here. It is +almost dark by day, and at night the stars +show yellow above the upper firs. The +wind goes murmuring between gray walls, +and the sound of the stream, far down, +comes vaguely save in the freshet month. +This is the farthest hiding place of all. +Only the daring would find the perilous +way to its solitude.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 344px;"> +<img src="images/illo_084.jpg" width="344" height="253" alt="Chapter XV" title="Chapter XV" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV.<br /> + +THE PLAY OF LEAVES</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_f.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="F" title="F" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">F</span>or</span> fox and partridge, fawn +and squirrel—all the wood +dwellers that run or fly—youth, +like the rest of life, is +a time of stress and effort. +They have a short babyhood and little +childhood. Once they begin to move they +must take up for themselves the burden +of those that prey and are preyed upon. +They step from nest or den into a world +in arms against them, and while they +sensibly fail to worry over this, undoubtedly +it complicates their fun. Baby foxes +playing are winsome innocents, but they +have become sly and wary while lambs, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>colts, and calves are still making themselves +admirably ridiculous in fenced meadows. +And neither hunter, hawk, nor +wildcat makes allowances for the youth +and inexperience of debutante game.</p> + +<p>It is different with little leaves. They +are as playful as kittens, with their dances, +poses, flutters, their delicate bursts of glee. +Unless involved with flowers, or with timber +or real estate, they are safe, not alone +in winter babyhood, but through spring +and summer, that minister to them with +baths of dew and rain and with the somnolent +wine of the sun. Only when old +age has brought weariness with winds and +heat, and even with the drawing of sap, +are they confronted by their enemy, frost. +You will say, caterpillars, forest fires, but +they are the fault of man and an unanticipated +flaw in nature’s plan for letting +the leaves off easily. We brought foreign +trees that had their own mysterious protection +at home into lands where that +immunity vanished, and so the chestnut +has left us, and apple and rose are threatened +by foes whom their mother had not +foreseen. Were it not for man’s mistakes +the leaves would have had an outrageously +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>gay time by comparison with the darkling +lives of the creatures that move among +them and beneath them.</p> + +<p>All winter long in its leaf bud the baby +tulip leaf drowses, curled up tight. It is +completely ready to spring full formed +into the light as soon as the frost line has +been driven back by the triumphant lances +of the sun, and there it dips and laughs +and nods, and sometimes goes quite wild +when a running breeze comes by at the +hour wherein morning makes opals of +July’s heavy dew. The poplars, the +maidenhair trees, shake out spangles then. +The maples show their silver sides. Always +the forest lives and breathes, +but when the new leaves come it draws +long, shuddering breaths of delight. +Whoever has dwelt with trees knows how +differently the small leaves of May talk +from the draped and weighted boughs of +August.</p> + +<p>Stepping along the rustling wood road, +you can hear the reveries of the leaves +around you. They whisper and sigh in +youth; they reach out to touch the friendly +stranger’s cheek. In summer they hang +their patterned curtains tenderly about +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>him, in a silence made vocal only by a +teasing gale. In autumn they are loud +beneath his tread. Snow alone can hush +them. When they are voiceless they are +dead at last, but already their successors, +snugly cradled and blanketed with cotton, +are being rocked to sleep upon the twigs.</p> + +<p>The rippling, shimmering birch upon a +wind-stroked hill talks with falling cadence, +like a chant. The naiad willow, arching +lowland brooks, speaks as water, very +secretly. The oak could not be silent, +with his story of many days to tell, and +keeping his leaves throughout the snow +time, his speech is perpetual. Only the +pines and kindred evergreens are now and +then melancholy, as if the new needles and +leaves looked down upon the carpet below, +forever thickened, of those whose hold +grew faint. Leaves of cherry and apple, +born into a world of tinted blossoms, are +gay to the last. The sprays of locust +leaves that keep their yellow-green until +the sober tree flowers into clustered fragrance +of white, arboreal sweet peas whisper +by night and day of the bats and tree +toads that dwell in their channeled and +vine-loved bark. The sycamore’s voice is +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>cool-toned and light, but the mountain ash +murmurs low, and low the beech.</p> + +<p>Watching leaves adrift on November +winds, there comes the memory of Stevenson’s +song of another ended life—of days +they “lived the better part. April came +to bloom and never dim December +breathed its killing chill.” But the tree +that wore them, standing in stripped +starkness that month—if stark means +strong—shall enter dazzling splendors +when the days of ice storms come. That +miracle of lucent grayness, an elm in the +morning sun, when every branch and every +smallest twig is cased in ice outdoes its +green enchantments of June. It is more +beautiful than a tree of coral. It is the +color of pussy willows made to shine. It +is as gray as sunrise cobwebs on the grass, +as starlight on dew. Its branches, tossed +by January, clash sword on delicate sword, +or, left quiet, the elm stands like a pensive +dancer and swings against one another +long strands of crystal beads. And in the +city little ice-sheathed maples along an +avenue, glistening under white arc lights, +surpass the changing lusters of gray +enamel. Trees robed in ice are the very +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>home of light, of fire frozen fast in water +and turned pale.</p> + +<p>Between the going and coming of the +leaves the sky is background for the cunning +lacework of twigs. Were it always +May, we should never see how finely +wrought is the loom upon which those +leafy embroideries are woven. In autumn +the design is more austere, the colors show +more somber, but when the March branches +flush with sap, and the buds, waking, +put forth hesitant green fingers, that infinitely +complex tracery of the twigs is a +spring charm as moving as the perfume +of the thorn. Outlined against a sunset, +it foretells in beauty the months when the +leaf chorus will sound with the birds’.</p> + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 342px;"> +<img src="images/illo_090.jpg" width="342" height="251" alt="Chapter XVI" title="Chapter XVI" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI.<br /> + +THE BROWN FRONTIER</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 116px;"> +<img src="images/initial_o.jpg" width="116" height="110" alt="O" title="O" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">O</span>ne</span> warm March noon a +hushing wing is lifted from +the piping nest of earth. +Voices of forest floor, tree +trunk, and lowground break +forth, never to be silent again until Thanksgiving +weather finds a muted world. +Croon and murmur from the swaying +grasses, brief lyrics from the top of the +thorn, a sunrise chant from the bee tree, +rise and fall through all the hours of dew +and light, intense in the sun-rusted fields, +climbing to an ecstatic swan song when +frosts hover close. Whoever walks through +middle realms of the woods, never lying +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>on the mosses nor winning to skyward +branches of the trees, has not shared the +earth’s most ardent life—the pensive songs +a bird sings merely for himself; his impulsive, +goalless flights; and rarer still the +industry and traffic at the roots of growth: +the epic of the ground.</p> + +<p>Cricket follows pickering frog and +cicada cricket. That earliest invisible +singer asks only a little warmth in the +waters of the pond to melt the springs of +frozen song. He comes with lady’s-tresses, +pussy willows, and unfurling lily +pads. The cricket, sleepy-voiced in the +August afternoon, grows gay at twilight, +and does his best when the firefly and bat +are abroad, darting out from the creeper-veiled +bark and setting sail upon the +placid air. Locusts play persistently a +G string out of tune until, when the first +goldenrod peers above the yarrow, the +overwhelming night chorus of the katydids +is heard, lifted bravely again and +again within the domains of autumn, not +quenched before the bittersweet berry and +the chestnut fling open portals and surrender +to the cold.</p> + +<p>Little they know of trees who have not +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>seen spruce and larches against the deep +October sky, looking straight up from a +yielding club-moss pillow. The outlines +and colors of the quiet branches are shown +most memorably upon the vault of that +arching lapis-lazuli roof, draped with floating +chiffon of the clouds. Climb up among +the boughs, and the carven quality is gone. +They are dim and soft. You must go +close to earth to behold tree-top forms. +The supine view is magical.</p> + +<p>Revealed in uncanny splendor by the +death of verdure, brilliant and evil fungi +come from the dark mold in fall, orange +and copper, vermilion and cinnabar, dwelling +as vampires upon trees brought low. +Some wear the terra-cotta of the alert +little lizards that, inquisitive as squirrels, +will lift their heads from bark or stone +and give back gaze for gaze. As leaves +that came from the sap of roots go back +to the roots in ashes, so ants take care +that fallen oaks shall be transformed into +the soil from which young oaks will spring, +and brown dust, when they have ended, +is all that abides of the tallest tree. Among +them pass the bobbing, glistening beetles. +This immortal and thronging activity of +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>the loam can be heard, if you bend low +enough and listen long.</p> + +<p>When the air is frost-clear fairy landscapes, +hidden since spring came with +mists and masking leaves, rise with an +effect of unbeheld creation. Small pools +appear, and avenues among the bracken +that still wave banners of chestnut and +old gold. The lonely homes of ground-nesting +birds grow visible. Trinkets are +scattered as the forest makes ready for +night—tiny cones, abandoned snail shells, +and feathers which the woodpecker and +oriole dropped when they took leave. +The sun dapples with yellow the partridge +haunts where once drooped films of maidenhair +fern.</p> + +<p>The home that the squirrel built for his +summer idyl is shattered by the winds +aloft and falls to earth with other finished +things. The feathery wrack of cat-tails +sails the waters and is hung upon the +grasses of the marsh. Fallow fields spread +a tangle of livid stems, but jewels lie in +the wood road, for berries, the last harvest, +are shaken down by bird gleaners +from vine and shrub, where they hang in +festal plenty, so that all hardy creatures +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>that do not fly from winter to the South +or to an underground Nirvana may here +find reward. Dark blue beads drop from +the woodbine. The rose keeps her carmine +caskets, full of other roses; but the +bayberry is generous with dove-gray pebble +seeds. Witch-hazel, reversing seasons like +the eccentric trout—who, after all, probably +enjoys the solitude at the stream-heads +after the other fish have gone—sends +wide her mysterious fusillade, and +that, too, finds its aim in the floor of the +forest.</p> + +<p>Life more remote than that of snowfield +or jungle, beneath our tread, guarded from +our glances and our hearing unless we +seek it out, the subtle cycles of the soil +go on everlastingly, alien even to those +who know in intimacy the meadows and +the woods. Vigorously though it toils, +there is a peace in the vision of continuity +delicately given. Most of the singers in +the mowing grass live for a day, yet next +morning the song ascends unbroken. Here +on the frontier between the world of the +air and that within the earth passports +are granted back and forth—the red lily +is summoned from the depths; the topmost +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>acorn, lifting its cup toward the sky, +obediently falls and passes through the +dark barrier, to return when the life-call +bids. Steadily go on arrival and departure. +The gorgeous lichen is hung upon +the rotting log. White rue rises and white +snows sink. Fire demons split the rocks, +and after them in a thousand years comes +bloodroot. Floods rush down, and windflowers +and cities follow; and leisurely, +another spring, the gates that received +them part, and a legion of new cowslips +marches out.</p> + + + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 341px;"> +<img src="images/illo_096.jpg" width="341" height="352" alt="Chapter XVII" title="Chapter XVII" /> +</div> + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII.<br /> + +FAR ALTARS</h2> + + +<div class="initial" style="width: 101px;"> +<img src="images/initial_g.jpg" width="101" height="110" alt="G" title="G" /></div> +<p class="dropcapsection"><span class="firstwords"> +<span style="display: none;">G</span>uarded</span> by treacherous +green marshes whose murmuring +rushes will close without +a change of cadence over +the despair of the unwarned, +in August there lives a scene of tender and +appealing beauty. The languid creek, +turned the color of iron rust with +its plunder—spoil of the wild and impractical +fertility of the roots of bog and +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>bracken—pauses in a pool that shows now +brown, now sorrel, now satiny green as the +clouds wait or hasten above and the +supple rushes lean back and forth. This +is the tourney field of gorgeous dragonflies. +Emerald, gold, and amethyst, they +hold resplendent play, sparkling above the +water like magnets of light, causing the +placid depths to shimmer, and drawing +the minnows from their sunlit rest. Even +the bird-dog does not know this pool. No +messenger more personal than a prowling +shot comes there from man.</p> + +<p>It is a sturdy conceit that wonders why +Nature should spend her freshest art on +treasure scenes she decrees invisible, as if +the mother of mountains, tempests, deserts, +toiled anxiously for the approval of a +particular generation, keeping one eye on +Mr. Gray and the other on Mr. Emerson +in the hope that they will justify her flower +blushing unseen and her excusable rhodora. +Nature is far too unmoral to bother about +rendering economists an account for her +spendthrift loveliness. She willfully deserts +the imitation Sicilian garden, though +she would be well paid to stay, and rollicks +in the jungle, clothing magnificently the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>useless snake and leopard, dressing their +breakfast in paradise plumes, puzzling +Victorian poets, and badly scaring the +urban manicurist, who returns after her +first country vacation with decided views +concerning the cheerful humanity of streets +compared with lodges in the wilderness.</p> + +<p>Were Nature careworn and personal, +where should we turn for consolation or +rest? Hers is the tonic gift of a strength +that, underlying all life, does not pity or +praise. As in the Cave of the Winds the +most restless spirit surely might find peace, +so in the eternal changefulness of the +forest under the touch of forces fierce or +serene we find the soul of quiet because +the powers at work are beyond our control, +control us utterly, hold us in an immense +and soothing grasp where thought +and energy are fused and contend no more. +So those who live upon the ocean come +to possess that which they will not barter +for ease, and so the timber cruiser shortens +his visit to town. They would not tell +what they gain who relinquish readily the +things for which others pour out their +years upon the ground that commerce may +grow. It is because words are not fashioned +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>to speak what shapes the wind takes, +the motion whereby mists climb after the +sun out of ravines, or how the tropic +orchids lift at daybreak among their fragrant +shadows wings of ivory and fawn +that drooped against ferny trunks.</p> + +<p>Many days must bloom and fade between +you and the sound of human voices +before, in the wilderness, there can be +surrender to the giant arms that forever +hold the body, and to the spirit, supreme +and unemotional, that has sped beyond +the utmost outposts the mind ever reached. +But after the homecoming—when the confused +echoes of a swarming, blind humanity +are lost in the exalted quiet of wide +spaces—the vast impersonality of woods +and plains, swamps, hills, and sea, takes +on a tenderness more deep than lies in +human gift and a glorious hostility that +calls to combat without grudge or motive, +ennobling because it gives no mercy; +challenges alike the craft of man and the +strength of the hills.</p> + +<p>The exuberant fancy of a less earnest +day made air and fire the dwellings of +creatures formed like ourselves, and, +though immortal, shod with lightning, +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>guarded from common sight, they were +afflicted with our own vexations, our loves +and hates. Nymph and naiad, faun and +satyr, were always plotting and gossiping, +and little better were the subsequent +gnomes and fairies—more personal and +cantankerous than persons; resorting upon +occasion to divorce; tangling skeins, and +teasing kind old horses. These were not +the earth deities.</p> + +<p>Earth deities wear no human shape. +No one has looked upon the sky fire’s face, +the pinions of the gale. Enormously they +have wrought, without regard for man and +sharing no passion, yet yielding sometimes +their limitless force to the mind +that soared with them. In the age of +winged serpents, in the days when Assyria +was mistress, they were the same, holding +an equal welcome for the boy and sage, +unchanging and unresting, free from mortal +attributes of good and evil, mighty and +healing as no half-human god could be. +Therefore that lavish scattering of beauty +without regard to man. Therefore the +wonder given to all who dare call to them +when far from other men.</p> + +<p>The disrepute of the pathetic fallacy has +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>come from making the forest sentimental. +Sentient beyond all doubt its lovers +know it is. Even as water visibly rebels, +warring with headlands and leaping after +the wind, and as it slumbers dimpling and +caresses the swimmer, so the woodlands +are solemn and aloof, or breathe to give +the open-hearted their vast serenity. The +nymph or fairy rises at the bidding of +imagination, but the everlasting deities of +the elements, past our reckoning elder +than they, need no fiction. They are +presences, and accord communion. They +can be gentle as the twilight call of quail. +They can be indifferent and gigantic as the +prairie fire and typhoon. But they brood +to-day as yesterday over cities that they +will not enter, but which sometimes they +destroy. They march above mountain +ridges and loiter among flowered laurel, +impartial as nothing else is, and in their +dispassionate companionship supremely +consoling, offering for playthings the ripple +and the gleam.</p> + + +<p class="theend">THE END</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Minstrel Weather, by Marian Storm + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MINSTREL WEATHER *** + +***** This file should be named 38645-h.htm or 38645-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/6/4/38645/ + +Produced by Irma Spehar, Markus Brenner and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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