XLII 



NOVEMBER VOICES 



With flowers and leaves, the bird 

 songs have faded out, and the hum and 

 chirp of insect life, the low and bleat of 

 herds and flocks afield, and the busy 

 sounds of husbandry have grown infre- 

 quent. There are lapses of such silence 

 that the ear aches for some audible sig- 

 nal of life ; and then to appease it there 

 comes with the rising breeze the solemn 

 murmur of the pines like the song of 

 the sea on distant shores, the sibilant 

 whisper of the dead herbage, the clatter 

 of dry pods, and the fitful stir of fallen 

 leaves, like a scurry of ghostly feet flee- 

 ing in affright at the sound of their own 

 passage. 



The breeze puffs itself into a fury of 

 wind, and the writhing branches shriek 

 and moan and clash as if the lances of 

 phantom armies were crossed in wild 

 mel^e. 



205 



