30 THE DESERT AND THE ROSE 



Organs. Strewn from the western desert's wild 

 wings across the unpaintable blue of the twilight 

 sky stream rose-red pennants, tender yet resplend- 

 ent — not the washed out hue of other sunset skies 

 but the soul satisfying glory of color the desert sky 

 alone can show. 



And then when morning dawns after one of these 

 obnoxious winds, you look up to meet, as it were, 

 the blue, innocent eye of a little child, quite igno- 

 rant of having given offence. "What have I done 

 that you should be angry with me?" a voice as in- 

 nocent as the eye seems to say. What indeed! 

 Nature is impenitent, but you forgive her, and go 

 forth to inhale the clear-blown, life-giving atmos- 

 phere without more words. 



With what completeness in these southern lands 

 are soiled pages turned! One Christmas I was 

 journeying across Louisiana after a season of piti- 

 less rains. Most of the sugar cane was cut and lay 

 sodden in the fields. In the dense woods trees stood 

 knee deep in water, gray moss dripping from their 

 branches. Palms thrust stiff green fingers upward, 

 and from time to time, as we passed, a crimson 

 flower flashed at us. Rank and decaying vegetation 

 crowded, and through it miserable cattle splashed. 

 And then, suddenly, the train rumbled out from 

 beneath the low clouds ; small towns appeared, front 

 yards bloomed, people rocked serenely on porches, 

 and the uncut cane glittered, a wide green plain, 

 in the blaze of a westering sun. Then a bayou dis- 

 played limpid waters, on the opal face of which 

 steamboats and live oaks were reflected — bright 



