SOUNDS OF EVENING. 15 



of hide and seek, uttering at intervals their 

 playful "a- wick, a- wick, a- wick/' 



The dark green of maple and juniper and 

 papaw contrast vividly with the lighter hue 

 of walnut and sycamore and blue-grass. The 

 earth is greedily soaking up the slowly falling 

 moisture. The gray clouds are doleful, pall 

 upon the spirit, keep suppressed the thoughts 

 which might well up did the beams of the set- 

 ting sun but fall around me. From somewhere, 

 out of the flotsam of the past as stored in mem- 

 ory's cells, there comes the phrase: "For the 

 turmoil in his soul has ended and peace has 

 come at last." For me it is not the peace of 

 death but the peace of content content with a 

 day of leisure now gone, content with nature, 

 almost unbroken, for my abiding place. 



The rain soon ceases, but the clouds remain. 

 The katydids begin to whet their wing covers 

 in preparation for their nightly serenade. The 

 long trill of a tree-toad comes intermittently 

 from the valley below. The sound of a wagon 

 driven rapidly across a wooden bridge travels 

 sharp and clear from half a mile or more. A 

 screech owl begins his plaintive whining note. 

 A whippoorwill utters two or three calls, then 

 ceases, for his love days for this year are over, 

 and not again will he make the welkin ring till 

 the wee hours of the morn. With such sounds 



