OCTOBER DAYS 



olation of winter, and only they brood 

 shadows. 



In such weather the woodland air is 

 laden with the light burden of odor, 

 the faintly pungent aroma of the ripened 

 leaves, more subtle than the scent of 

 pine or fir, yet as apparent to the nos- 

 trils, as delightful and more rare, for in 

 the round of the year its days are few, 

 while in summer sunshine and winter 

 wind, in springtime shower and autumnal 

 frost, pine, spruce, balsam, hemlock, and 

 cedar distill their perfume and lavish it 

 on the breeze or gale of every season. 



Out of the marshes, now changing 

 their universal green to brown and 

 bronze and gold, floats a finer odor than 

 their common reek of ooze and sodden 

 weeds — a spicy tang of frost-ripened 

 flags and the fainter breath of the land- 

 ward border of ferns ; and with these 

 also is mingled the subtle pungency of 

 the woodlands, where the pepperidge is 

 burning out in a blaze of scarlet, and the 

 yellow flame of the poplars flickers in the 

 lightest breeze. 



The air is of a temper neither too hot 

 nor too cold, and in what is now rather 

 170 



