PROPHETIC AUTUMN. 



is green with tiny baby plants of prickly 

 cleavers and ivy-leaved veronica. The seeds 

 fall from the mother-plant on the soil in 

 August, sprout and germinate with the Sep- 

 tember rains, and have formed a thick carpet 

 of spring-like verdure by the middle of 

 October. That is the common way with 

 most of our wild annuals. Unlike so many 

 pampered garden flowers, but like " fall " 

 wheat in cold climates, they sow themselves 

 in autumn, come up boldly at once, straggle 

 somehow through the winter, of course with 

 enormous losses, and are ready by spring to 

 welcome the first rays of returning sunshine. 

 Even the animals in like manner are busy 

 with their domestic preparations for next 

 summer. The foundress wasps, already 

 fertilized by the autumn brood of drones, 

 are retiring with their internal store of eggs 

 to warm winter quarters, ready to lay and 

 rear them in the earliest May weather. The 

 dormouse is on the look-out for a snug 

 hiding-place in the hazels. The caterpillars 



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