there is even now a goodly showing of reddened 

 leaves. A gum-tree or tupelo, the top of which 

 shows above the wall, is spotted with scarlet. It 

 seems too early by more than a month for all this 

 color, and may be due to local causes. Let us 

 hope so. Still, as the breeze, though it stole 

 very gently by, could not pass with silent foot- 

 steps, I heard a low murmur among the stones 

 of this old wall that hinted of autumn, singing 

 the same song that is whispered in the oaks, 

 weeks later, when the freshness of summer has 

 faded, and the leaves are dying and toughening 

 to withstand for a little while the onset of frost. 



While I yet lingered by the nightshade, the 

 botanist clambered over the fence, and brought 

 me tansy and mountain-mint. The fragrance of 

 the latter recalled many an herb hunt in the sum- 

 mers of past years, when the good custom was 

 still kept up to please the old folks, although the 

 herbs had long gone out of use. For old time's 

 sake, tansy, catnip, and balm hung from the beams 

 overhead in the unceiled kitchen, giving out an 

 odor that may have kept off the disease they were 

 intended to cure. " It 's all doctor's stuff, nowa- 

 days," remarked Humphrey Fagan; "but folks 

 die all the same, if not a little more so " and 

 his flabby sides, that had weathered nearly ninety 

 winters, would shake. I am ready to believe it. 

 The " yarb teas," as everybody called them, were 

 once in high repute, and deserved to be ; far more, 

 169 



