238 WOODLAND IDYLS. 



thick for that sun to melt only in such places 

 is that earth mold absent. Over all others it 

 spreads, a blanket made up of the ashes of 

 death, yet full of the potency of life-giving ele- 

 ments, ready to yield protoplasm and store en- 

 ergy, wherever and whenever the germ of life is 

 quickened into action by the proper medley of 

 moisture and of warmth. 



The sun father and ruler of all up there, 

 far distant in that space immeasurable by man, 

 controls all life upon this crust of the mother 

 earth. Here and there over her surface, when 

 he deigns to shine with the proper modicum of 

 light and heat, he begets the transmission of 

 moisture, then tickles the earth 's mold blanket 

 into yielding up its stored elements that life 

 may be where death did reign. Nothing of mat- 

 ter new gives he, only the power to be, only the 

 power to cause the sap or blood to tingle and 

 surge, to mount higher and higher, to form new 

 cells where the flame of life may burn until the 

 call of death doth come. The matter is here, in 

 the blanket mold of mother earth; the energy 

 there, in the fountain head of father sun. The 

 two do meet and mingle, then beget, from seed 

 eternal, a living thing. 



