244 Summer's Afterglow 



middle air seems peopled with the majesty of the 

 wide-flung boughs, turning to the sunlight in full 

 autumnal glow against the pale blue sky, or tinged 

 here and there by the lingering mist that dwells 

 in the unleaved crowns as if in shells of gold. For, 

 as the leaves grow thin, it is usually those on the 

 fringes of the outmost twigs which are the last to 

 fall ; so that, even after the full body of each tree's 

 foliage is gone, its outline is preserved in the tremu- 

 lous and parting mists with the soft luminousness 

 of sand-hills under the moon. 



The splendour of the yellow elms eclipses for a 

 time in mid-November the beauty of all other trees. 

 While the elm boughs are bursting into flame, the 

 deeper orange and crimson of the beeches are already 

 fading and thinning on their boughs ; and the 

 smouldering russet of the oaks cannot compete 

 with the brilliance of the elms, though it offers 

 a sober and splendid background to their fire, and 

 will still be glowing on when all but the last casual 

 survivors of the elm leaves have fallen to decay. 

 Yet in a landscape of rich and varied timber no 

 moment of the year except perhaps some warm 

 week in later April when the buds are opening most 

 freely can display our familiar trees in so many 

 different stages of their leaf. Here and there a 

 stubborn oak is seen with its foliage scarcely 

 changed from its uniform dark green of the August 

 heats ; only on a close inspection can the grain of 

 the leaf be seen to be coarsened and hard, while 

 their strong dark green is faintly but unmistakably 

 suffused with the bronze-brown of incipient decay. 



