MYSTICAL PASTURES 231 



there was no wind to give them voice. The still 

 flood of golden sunshine warmed to the marrow, 

 yet did not wilt as in summer. Instead, it in- 

 formed all things with a glow like an elixir of 

 life. To feel it well within one's flesh is to have 

 a forecasting of immortality, to know that one is 

 to be born again and again. I did not wonder 

 that as I once more scanned the hedgerow along 

 the ancient wall I saw my white moth clamber 

 bravely up a goldenrod stem and begin a half- 

 scrambling, half-fluttering pilgrimage from one 

 to another of the hardy blooms that had survived 

 the frost as well as he. Most of the goldenrod 

 and meadow sweet blooms are well past their 

 prime and are showing gray with age and ripen- 

 ing pappus, but here and there you find belated 

 specimens that hold color and honey still, and 

 on these he paused to breakfast. Then, as his 

 wings rested for a moment, I could see that his 

 pure white was touched with tiny chain patterns 

 of black spots and I knew him for Cingalia cate- 

 naria, the chain-streak moth. Somehow I am 

 half-sorry to have found him out. I am not sure 

 but I would rather have remembered him as one 

 of the mystical fancies of the early dawn, some 

 pure white dream materialized out of the tenuous 



