2 THE FALL OF THE YEAR 



creep" from room to room ? No ; and I am not 

 alone. 



High overhead the clouds are drifting past ; and 

 between them, far away, is the blue of the sky 

 and how blue, how cool, how far, far away ! But 

 how near and warm seems the earth ! 



I lie outstretched upon it, feeling the burnt crisp 

 grass beneath me, a beetle creeping under my 

 shoulder, the heat of a big stone against my side. I 

 throw out my hands, push my fingers into the hot 

 soil, and try to take hold of the big earth as if I 

 were a child clinging to my mother. 



And so I am. But I am not frightened, as I used 

 to be, when the little mouse went "creepy-creep," 

 and my real mother brought a candle to scare the 

 mouse away. It is because I am growing old? 

 But I cannot grow old to my mother. And the earth 

 is my mother, my second mother. The beetle mov- 

 ing under my shoulder is one of my brothers ; the 

 hot stone by my side is another of my brothers ; the 

 big oak tree over me is another of my brothers; 

 and so are the clouds, the white clouds drifting, drift- 

 ing, drifting, so far away yonder, through the blue, 

 blue sky. 



The clock of the year strikes one. The summer 

 sun is overhead. The flood-tide of summer life has 

 come. It is the noon hour of the year. 



The drowsy silence of the full, hot noon lies deep 

 across the field. Stream and cattle and pasture-slope 



