LAUGHING WATERS [ [ 



above this is that element of personality, a charm 

 purely feminine, and eluding any attempt to hold it. 



Peculiarly sensitive to light and air, a pond is 

 susceptible of little moods that do not come to 

 the sea. It is the eye of the landscape. Dawn, 

 high noon and dusk are each reflected there. Its 

 afternoon mood is not like that of the morning 

 any more than is our own. The more passive it 

 is, the more perfectly it reflects the heavens. At 

 all time it draws to itself light from the sky, and 

 when the surrounding woods are swallowed in the 

 advancing darkness, still gleams with a faint opal- 

 escence. These pale glimmers illumine the bogs, 

 where a pool has caught and retained the daylight, 

 or rather the speftral light of dawn. One appears 

 to look through this serene and reflecting surface 

 into the heart of some other wood, darkly myste- 

 rious and impenetrable, which vanishes when the 

 wind blows, as if the curtain were drawn. 



Gently as snowflakes, the leaves detach them- 

 selves and settle on the ponds, to sail away like 

 diminutive barks upon those friendly seas. Num- 

 berless sails of scarlet and gold softly scud before 

 the breeze, threading the inlets between the button- 

 bushes and crowding the miniature bays; oriental 



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