and many excitements, until, almost before one 
could believe it possible, the time of autumn 
came. There were many signs of this on every 
hand. The tule rushes, now five or six feet tall, 
had stopped growing and their lower leaves were 
turning brown. The sage on the desert was 
=> 
— 
— 
he would snatch it from the bill of the surprised and 
disappointed diver. 
losing its greenish gray color and, as one looked 
away up the western slopes toward the rimrock 
where the ravens slept, the hills seemed to be 
turning purple. The little wrens no longer 
sang in the marsh at sunrise and the meadow- 
lark, that master singer of days gone by, was 
silent or had flown away. 
228 
