mitchella with a red berry or two, or a clump of 

 ground-pine and a drift of beech and scarlet oak 

 leaves. On occasion appears a solitary gleaming 

 amanita. Over the rich seal-brown of ancient 

 hemlock stumps is a tracery of the gray-green 

 cladonia with its scarlet fruiting cups. What are 

 Tabriz, Daghestan, Bokhara and the rest to this? 

 These odorous pine-needles are the magic carpet 

 which gently conveys one into the sylvan world 

 of faun and nymph. Now it is a sunbath we want 

 rather than a cold dip, to bask in the warmth 

 like any cottontail. To lie in some sheltered spot 

 while the frost is taking off the last leaves, and 

 become saturated with sunlight, is a mellowing 

 process, and ripens one, as tomatoes are ripened 

 on the window-sill or grapes on the trellis. 



As the vivid hues of the red maple fade in the 

 swamp and are replaced by the soft silvery gray 

 and purplish sheen of the bark, the oaks on 

 the hillside become ruddy. The coloring is rich 

 and subdued, rather than brilliant and glowing as 

 at first mahogany and maroon set off by the 

 purple mists of Indian summer. And now at last 

 branches are bare and leaves rustle underfoot. 



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