178 FOOTING IT IN FRANCONIA 



the face of a clock), till by the 30th the 

 colors were as brilliant as one could wish, 

 though with less than the usual proportion 

 of yellow. 



The white birches, which should have 

 supplied that hue, were practically leafless. 

 A small caterpillar (the larva of a tiny 

 moth, one of the Microlepidoptera) had 

 eaten the greenness from every white-birch 

 leaf in the whole country roundabout. One 

 side of Mount Cleveland, for example, 

 looked from a distance as if a fire had swept 

 over it. It was a real devastation ; yet, to 

 my surprise, as the maple groves turned red 

 the total effect was little, if at all, less beau- 

 tiful than in ordinary seasons. The leafless 

 purplish patches gave a certain indefinable 

 openness to the woods, and the eye felt the 

 duller spaces as almost a relief. I could 

 never have believed that destruction so 

 widespread and lamentable could work so 

 little damage to the appearance of the land- 

 scape. As the old Hebrew said, everything 

 is beautiful in its time. 



We were four at table, and in front of 

 the evening fireplace, but in footing it we 



