72 THE SUMMER 



field that has been stripped of its golden 

 wealth, and amid the beauty and the 

 riches of the summer earth the naked 

 stubble speaks of the fulfilment of na- 

 ture's promise, of the pathos that haunts 

 the harvest of the year. 



The declining sun now sheds a rosy 

 light across the eastern hills, a wander- 

 ing beetle drones past on its evening 

 flight, and 



" All the air a solemn stillness holds/' 

 High up among the gray rocks a goat- 

 sucker is hawking for moths, and its 

 lonely voice trembles across the melan- 

 choly moor. But before the waters of 

 the stream have mirrored the lingering 

 evening light, their surface will be ruf- 

 fled with the dimples and ripples of many 

 rising trout. 



With the silence of a water-vole, that 

 slides into its aquatic home with neither 

 flop nor splash, the big fish are feeding 

 upon the unsuspecting sedge-flies in the 



