AUGUST. 247 



Conquer all mysteries by rule and line ; 

 Empty the haunted air, and gnomed mine ; 

 Unweave a rainbow, as it erewhile made 

 The tender-personed Lamia melt into a shade. 



KEATS. 



Birds are now seen wandering about in large 

 flocks, having completed all their summer cares, 

 and now enjoy the range of earth and air in one 

 long holiday, till their companies shall be thinned by 

 gunpowder and winter weather. 



This glowing month frequently presents splendid 

 appearances in the highly electric clouds. In 

 August, 1827, I was walking in the country early in 

 the morning. The sky was perfectly clear till the 

 sun rose above the horizon. The country was then 

 gradually obscured by a thick haze, which about an 

 hour afterwards soared steadily but rapidly aloft, 

 leaving the landscape as clear as before, but filling 

 the sky with an unbroken expanse of motionless 

 cloud. I returned in the evening ; the heavens and 

 earth exhibited a magnificent spectacle. The land- 

 scape possessed a striking lustre and clearness, and 

 was brought, as it were, immediately to the eye by 

 that effect of transparent vapour which often pre- 

 cedes thunder-storms. The vault of heaven was 

 strewn with what are called horse-tail clouds, some 

 white, drawn out like webbs of some light and 

 transparent texture suddenly seized and tossed 

 about by a giant hand, and curling up at their ex- 

 tremities like tempestuous and foamy billows. In 

 the west the setting sun cast up his lines of radiating 



