1 68 ANNALS OF BIRD LIFE. 



the wild woods and watch this grand change 

 slowly take place. To breathe the bracing air, 

 pure and fresh as only the country knows it ; to 

 see the glorious tints deepen and intensify over 

 the woods ; to watch the bracken and the ferns 

 and brambles turn into gold and brown and purple ; 

 to observe the habits of the birds, and beasts, and 

 insects ; to hold communion with Nature in the 

 gloaming ; to see the fog-banks float across the 

 dew- soaked meadows, and melt away before the 

 rising sun ; to contemplate the maze of gossamer, 

 spangled and beaded with dew-drops, which yokes 

 together in fairy net-work every twig, and leaf, 

 and grass-blade ; to listen to the mellow music 

 of the few autumnal songsters ; to admire the 

 clustering wild fruits and berries, and the painted 

 fungi ; to smell the fragrance arising from the 

 damp, fallen leaves at morning and evening ; to 

 gaze at the brilliant " harvest " moon peacefully 

 beaming over the sleeping fields ; to muse upon 

 the endless themes which Autumn ever inspires in 

 a contemplative mind all, all these are pleasures 

 indeed which make the autumn months bright and 

 beautiful, and surround them with a charm as 

 bewitching as it is rare and indescribable ! 



Of all the seasons of the year I love the 

 autumn best; it is my greatest delight to watch 

 the beauties of the year's decline, seeing in them, 

 not the signs of decay and death, but a brilliant 

 promise and a glorious hope of new generations of 

 life soon to rise, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of the 

 old! 



