GOOD-BYE TO SUMMER 227 



tumn winds it has begun to complain. On rainy 

 days especially I have heard this low lonesome 

 voice crying softly to itself through the dusk and 

 been at a loss to know what creature made it. 

 Foxes in the mating season along about St. Val- 

 entine's day make strange outcry in the wood, 

 but at this time of year the fox if he speaks at all 

 simply barks. A raccoon might whimper thus 

 but there were some cries that no coon ever made. 

 Once I stalked it for a lost child and I was long 

 in locating the exact spot whence it came. After 

 all it was only the complaining of the old tree 

 as it rubbed on its support in the swaying wind, 

 but it voiced all the loneliness of the good-byes 

 which a thousand bright creatures have been say- 

 ing to the wood these pleasant September days. 



