176 DAYS OF AUTUMN 



tenants of the wood have quitted. There 

 is silence in the cold air. Old and twisted, 

 the beech trees have yielded generations of 

 leaves uncurling from torch-like windings 

 when first the swallows come across the 

 sea ; the rooks built in their massy summer 

 greeneries; woodpeckers hewn a nesting 

 place in the rotten boles, spreading a white- 

 ness of chips on the moss beneath; starlings 

 with wings of metallic gleaming stolen their 

 old trysts, and jackdaws nested where the 

 branches had decayed and gaped. Far 

 down across the fields yonder the rooks 

 are following the plough. The jackdaws 

 have joined them, and as light ebbs at 

 evening they will return in a long stream 

 to the rookeries. 



The starlings haunt the watermeadows, 

 the mocking cry of the green " gallypot " 

 is heard no more. Walking quietly through 

 the solitude of the wood the wanderer may 

 see a squirrel storing his granaries with 

 mast and acorns, working earnestly lest 



