Autumn Sights and Musings 191 



That range of clouds in the east, fifty 

 miles away, their peaks shining rosy in 

 the sunset, their capes and cliffs throw- 

 ing purple shadows on the walls behind, 

 some sad-colored vapors swimming past to 

 heighten their seeming fixity and likeness 

 to mountains, how gladly the eye cheats 

 the mind into a faith that these great 

 visions are to harden into rock and snow 

 and stay there for a rest and inspiration to 

 the race ! Not only are these creations of 

 the air and sun beautiful in themselves, but 

 they heighten the charm of landscape and 

 keep us interested in their constant change. 

 Mountains grow in picturesqueness when 

 they toss off their cloud blankets of a 

 morning, or fling off gray remnants that 

 smoke along their sides after a rain, lifting 

 out of the forests like the sign of a great 

 battle, until the peak seems to bombard 

 the plain. Crimson fires flash among the 

 Rockies and are quenched in a moment. 

 You start at their ferocity and recall Vesu- 

 vius ; but it is only the sunset, with thin air 

 to see it through. 



Glooms stream pall-wise over the tops 



