CHAPTER VII. 



FRUITS AND AUTUMNAL DAYS. 



THE fruit of a plant is the portion to the develop- 

 ment of which all activities have been dedicated. The 

 root, the leaf, the flower, have all wrought to the 

 furtherance of this grand intention ; and the nearer the 

 time has come for the appearance of the fruit, the more 

 beautiful and alluring has the aspect of the plant become. 

 There is in this a wonderful and most exquisite anal- 

 ogy with the history of animal life. What the fruit is 

 to the plant, offspring is to the creature ; and hence 

 we find that it is towards pairing-time that birds 

 become vocal, and dressed with gayer plumage, and 

 that the sweet ingenuities of their little architecture 

 begin to show themselves in the hedges, beneath the 

 eaves of our houses, and in the innumerable quiet 

 places where nests and fledglings are supposed to be 

 secure, too often, alas I the contrary. Hence, too, 

 we find that, at the corresponding period in their 

 lives, fishes become more brilliant, their tinted scales 

 gleaming with unaccustomed colors as the swift fins 

 push the water aside, and the sunshine falls on them 

 slantingly. Hence, too, we find that the insect, when 



