AUGUST LILIES 



garden blossoms they, but 

 creatures of field and wood. 

 Leave the level lowlands, so 

 burdened with summer's lar- 

 gess of grain and fruit, and 

 ride into the hill-country. The narrow red 

 road winds betwixt quaint, ragged fields, all 

 whose fences are bedraped with vine and 

 brier. Here and there you see log-houses, 

 with big outside chimneys all overgrown 

 with the scarlet trumpet-vine. Down be- 

 tween the hills spring -fed runnels make 

 sparkling threads of silver. In the nar- 

 row levels on either hand the hill - folk 

 raise their scant crops. The hill sides, 

 cleared for fire and fencing, have been cul- 

 tivated until the soil is gone. Now they 

 gleam red and bare in spots, seamed with 

 deep gullies, and sparsely beset with wild 

 growths. In betwixt the clumps you see 

 lilies by thousands. How they live, what 

 sustenance they find in the stiff clay, is 



