THE END OF SUMMER 271 



is the same at the end of the day when he leads off his 

 horses and stopping at a wayside inn drinks on the kerb, 

 but first gives the one nearest him a gulp from the 

 tankard. 



All night for a week it rains, and at last there is a 

 still morning of mist. A fire of weeds and hedge-clippings 

 in a little flat field is smouldering. The ashes are crim- 

 son, and the bluish-white smoke flows in a divine cloudy 

 garment round the boy who rakes over the ashes. The 

 heat is great, and the boy, straight and well made, wear- 

 ing close gaiters of leather that reach above the knees, is 

 languid at his task, and often leans upon his rake to watch 

 the smoke coiling away from him like a monster reluct- 

 antly fettered and sometimes bursting into an anger of 

 sprinkled sparks. He adds some wet hay, and the smoke 

 pours out of it like milky fleeces when the shearer reveals 

 the inmost wool with his shears. Above and beyond him 

 the pale blue sky is dimly white-clouded over beech woods, 

 whose many greens and yellows and yellow-greens are 

 softly touched by the early light which cannot penetrate 

 to the blue caverns of shade underneath. Athwart the 

 woods rises a fount of cottage-smoke from among mellow 

 and dim roofs. Under the smoke and partly scarfed at 

 times by a drift from it is the yellow of sunflower and 

 dahlia, the white of anemone, the tenderest green and 

 palest purple of a thick cluster of autumn crocuses that 

 have broken out of the dark earth and stand surprised, 

 amidst their own weak light as of the underworld from 

 which they have come. Robins sing among the fallen 

 apples, and the cooing of wood-pigeons is attuned to the 

 soft light and the colours of the bowers. The yellow 



