25_ 



Through such downfalls the lightning faint- 

 ly shimmers, far, low mutterings of the thun- 

 der undervoice the plashing rain. Its long, 

 gray, slanting lines build a watery wall about 

 us. The eye cannot pierce it fifty yards. 

 Trees, almost tapping at the window-pane, 

 stand ghostly- dim against it, with hardly a 

 sighing sweep amid all their half-seen bud- 

 ded boughs. 



The sky is moveless, moulded all of 

 cloud, and changing only in depth of hue. 

 Through the fine, steady fall it is palely dun. 

 Heavy, washing rain comes out of' one, 

 darkly gray-purple so black, indeed, that 

 ofttimes darkness covers the face of earth. 



Through nights, through days, it pelts the 

 sodden mould. Still the wind sits at south, 

 a giant at ease, the clouds all in his eye. 

 Presently a short, sharp gust blows out of 

 the west. Another, still another, fitful, 

 snarling, furrowing the cloud into long 

 leaden ridges, that break and tumble one 

 over the other, as this new ill -wind doth 

 visit them so roughly. 



Now rain falls only in spurts and spits. 

 The cloud parts for a minute you see 

 through the rift the laughing blue beyond. 

 Now the gray ridgy pall falls over it. A 

 sharp touch comes into the air more than 



