Ready for Winter 209 



those that blanch early to foretell winter are 

 long since gone, and little besides the polypody, 

 the Christmas fern and its special kindred of the 

 aspidium name, look healthily satisfied with the 

 northwest winds. All things indeed are closing 

 up for rest, and presently the earth will be ready 

 for the winter to forbid and fetter its life, content 

 to sleep its time. Then, when the frost has quite 

 completed its ruthless work, and the snow has 

 covered the ruins of the verdurous year ; when 

 the landscape is brought into sober tints and the 

 sharp contrasts of white and black are brought 

 into harmony by the Master-artist ; then the 

 glory of the sky succeeds to the charm of earth. 



For while the earth is beautiful, inviting, famil 

 iar and infinitely various, there is little notion of 

 regarding the skies except as pendants and adorn 

 ments to this pleasant globe of ours. It is when 

 the obvious monotony of winter becomes oppres 

 sive that skyscapes take the lead of landscapes, 

 and our thoughts rise toward the unimaginable 

 reach of the starry vault, with its eternal distance 

 and extension. It is in such gazing that we feel 

 how insignificant is our physical being, and how 

 petty our mortal environment, how mighty our 

 spiritual reach, how tremendous our possible des 

 tiny ! 



In such a mood wrote Whitman: 

 N 



