28 



THE CYCLE OF THE SEASONS 



genial and serene. But yet there is an indefinable touch of melan- 

 choly interest everywhere present, as if unseen the parallels of the 

 enemy were hour by hour being brought closer to the ramparts of 

 summer's citadel. Possibly on the afternoon of the fourth or fifth 

 day of this bright interval the mellow atmosphere, under which 

 all nature has reposed in dreamy languor, yields to a leaden haze 

 which pales the yellow sunlight. This dim curtain is destined to 

 transform itself on the morrow into fierce gusts of wind and showers 

 of rain. 



The gorgeous pageant of the Indian summer is at an end for 

 another twelve months. The saturnalia are over. The Canadian 

 autumnal season in allegorical designs is not correctly personified 



AUTUMN : READY FOR A TRAMP. 



in accordance with the general idea by the figure of a melancholy 

 sad-eyed maid ; rather it whirls before us like some mad maenad 

 scattering with debonair graces ' the magnificent ashes of autumn/ 

 left by the passing of fierce flames of scarlet and gold over the 

 northern woodlands. 



Happy the sportsman who, for a few bright October days, has 

 left ' the weariness, the fever, and the fret ' of the populous city 

 to wander through woodland paths ankle deep in the rustling leafage, 

 kicking aside ' the flying gold of ruin'd woodlands.' He listens to 

 the pulsating reverberations of the ruffed grouse bursting into 

 the open from the fringes of some abandoned clearing, and 

 speedily drops into his game-bag a couple or two of the little red 



