October 
and indispensable of all the seasons, but like 
many practical and indispensable people, none 
the less wearisome on that account. Summer 
is an amiable season, and consequently rather 
milk-and-watery. 
If hope be the watchword of spring, faith, 
which is the assurance of hope, is that of 
autumn. Both seasons point forward: spring, 
into this life; autumn, into the life to come. 
The voice of spring is a joyous, ringing 
soprano; that of autumn, a deep, full, and 
serious contralto. And why should we not say 
that icy and blustering winter is vigorously 
masculine, with the tone and temper of a sonor- 
ous bass ? 
In the autumnal season a mature and serious 
air overspreads every natural object. It is a 
hushed and foreboding time. An expectant 
stillness pervades the landscape, a waiting look 
isin the massive, slumberous clouds that hang so 
fixed and solid in the clear blue sky. An al- 
most human sense of life finds mute expression 
in the dark, motionless, and almost contem- 
plative trees; there are whisperings sadly pleas- 
ing in the soft winds, that are never heard at 
other times ; and the rustle of the leaves has an 
ominous, as well as a retrospective sound. It is 
275 
