814 UPLAND AND MEADOW. 



ing top of this lone tree, still in full leaf, the old front- 

 yard of my earliest recollection came back to me very 

 vividly. The little paling that surrounded the trees 

 marked my playground, and beyond all was terra incog- 

 nita. In later years, when I dared venture in tlie 

 branches of the apple-trees in the lane, I longed to ex- 

 plore these poplare also, but to reach their tops, or even 

 to near them, proved impracticable. This the wary 

 crow-blackbirds seemed to know, for a colony nested 

 among them every summer. How I longed to secure a 

 nest, with its complement of eggs ! Day after day tliose 

 tantalizing nests, far out of reach, were watched, in 

 hopes, V)y some lucky mishap, one of them might be 

 dislodged. Still later, from some unknown cause, these 

 poplars sickened. Dead, leafless branches for a while 

 pointed skyward, rattled in the wind, and bit by bit 

 were scattered over the grass; and so, in a few brief 

 summers, these old trees were dead — not only the 

 home trees, but those of my neighbors — and now I know 

 of none within the range of my rambles, save the young 

 sapling that I found this morning. 



October 12. — The haze, the quiet, the soft south wind, 

 and towering trees, still green of leaf, and ribboned 

 with scarlet creepers, twining from trunk to twig, give 

 this perfect day that combination of color in perfection 

 which is the great seal of the month of October. The 

 harsh scream of the blue-jay waxes musical at such a 

 time; nothing seems crude or out of place. The squat, 

 broad-leaved oaks now show the deepest green. So 

 tough and leathery are their leaves that the late frost 



