102 WINTER SUNSHINE 



ture is breaking camp, as in spring she was going 

 into camp. The spring yearning and restlessness 

 is represented in one by the increased desire to 

 travel. 



Spring is the inspiration, fall the expiration. 

 Both seasons have their equinoxes, both their filmy, 

 hazy air, their ruddy forest tints, their cold rains, 

 their drenching fogs, their mystic moons ; both have 

 the same solar light and warmth, the same rays of 

 the sun ; yet, after all, how diff'erent the feelings 

 which they inspire ! One is the morning, the other 

 the evening; one is youth, the other is age. 



The difference is not merely in us; there is a 

 subtle difference in the air, and in the influences 

 that emanate upon us from the dumb forms of 

 nature. All the senses report a difference. The 

 sun seems to have burned out. One recalls the 

 notion of Herodotus that he is grown feeble, and 

 retreats to the south because he can no longer face 

 the cold and the storms from the north. There is 

 a growing potency about his beams in spring, a wan- 

 ing splendor about them in fall. One is the kindling 

 fire, the other the subsiding flame. 



It is rarely that an artist succeeds in painting 

 unmistakably the difference between sunrise and 

 sunset; and it is equally a trial of his skill to put 

 upon canvas the difterence between early spring and 

 late fall, say between April and November. It 

 was long ago observed that the shadows are more 

 opaque in the morning than in the evening; the 

 struggle between the light and the darkness moro 



