AFTERMATH 335 



terraced gardens by the clinging greenery, but now 

 standing out in nakedness, like unquarried granite, 

 as if awaiting the chisel of creative thought. 



The river, too, assumes a different aspect in 

 this aftermath season. If we stand above it and 

 look up its course it is revealed as a power, cut- 

 ting its way and adjusting its own surroundings, 

 while in the growing season it seems a careless 

 waterway, to be controlled and held in check by 

 its flowery borders, and, unless pushed by the 

 sudden, passionate impulse of a flood, too suave 

 to break away from them. 



Nuts and the various seed -pods are in them- 

 selves a study, as much apart from that of the 

 perfect flower as are the catkins of early Spring; 

 and all along the way we paused to look at first 

 one and then another. The Hop Hornbeam found 

 along the Hollow road has graceful, drooping pods 

 like Hops pulled out twice their length. Such 

 Tulip trees as had not raised their straight shafts 

 out of the line of vision bore upright pods, sug- 

 gestive of dice -cups when seen from below. The 

 crimson pyramids of Sumac berries were in the 

 velvet, so to speak, a depth of color that they 

 retain, like the sturdy Rose Hips, even when, after 

 much frost, they are backgrounded by snow. 



