26 mature Stufcies in Berkshire. 



swelled into the full light, against a clear blue firma- 

 ment. The farm-lands, cleared well up the mountain- 

 sides, looked rich and thrifty. Over the whole scene 

 brooded an air of serenity and quiet such as Millet 

 has put into the famous "Angelus." The light 

 which fell down from the hills and filled the deep 

 glen was that tender, pensive glow in which is 

 blended the spirit of two afternoons, — the afternoon 

 of the day and of the summer. 



But the fulness of the flood was past. There was 

 a subsidence of the deep light in the sky above and 

 a fading of the glow upon the earth beneath. Slowly 

 the torrents of sunbeams, which all day had poured 

 from the golden urn, the sun's exhaustless reservoir, 

 began to slacken in their flow. Then, as always 

 with a great deluge when the rains have ceased and 

 the feeding streams, there began the slow ebb of the 

 mighty tides. Down the slopes, yard by yard and 

 rod by rod, out of the open glen, over the wide roll- 

 ing meadows, the great August freshet subsides. 

 The sunshine rolls backward in great surges and 

 little waves toward the west. The outlines of the 

 mountains and the forests and the rocks grow hard 

 and dark, like land newly emerging from the deep. 

 The glory fades from the landscape. Up from deeps 

 of the glen come the lowing of kine, the shout of the 

 herdsmen, as they follow the retreating tides and 

 return to their homes, as men come back to houses 

 whence the rising waters drove them out. From 

 the forest-shadows and from the boughs of orchard 



