194 MY DEVON YEAR 



fern and heath, yet pursues its way Hke a rainbow, 

 and leaves no gloomy gorge nor solitary tor forgotten. 

 The colour runs like a fire, and whole forests catch 

 it in a night The cherry's foliage at a spinny edge 

 suddenly dons its last blood -red robe, and on the 

 magic signal, glade after glade replies with kindling 

 illumination — each herb, and shrub, and forest tree 

 after her kind. A single fern turns pale or red, and 

 in a week the hue of the hills has changed. 



Nor is it all a ororo-eous demonstration of death out- 

 spread upon the earth, for in this march of the seasons 

 Nature has determined that no time shall lack its own 

 treasures of perfected life, its proper blossom, its fruit, 

 and its promise of fruit The oak's autumn is the 

 springtime of the scarlet-crowned fungus, of the hosts 

 of the agarics, and other small, hooded people. High 

 winter for the naked larch and beech will find many 

 a moss-tuft brimming with minute loveliness and 

 dainty moss-flowers showing in the stalk-tips. The 

 giants fling their arms into the sky for the wind to 

 play upon ; but, beneath them, fairy hosts prosper, 

 fulfil the law, and make their own little summer at 

 each tree-foot, fearless of rain and storm, patient of 

 the frost, thankful for one gleam of the winter sun. 

 We see the whole stupendous cycle for a year or 

 two, and watch the Mother's pictures each in turn as 

 they pass unceasing ; but these creatures of the field 

 and wood glorify their own hours alone, without 

 dreaming of what is passed, or knowing what is to 

 come. Each leaf and petal, each amber stipule and 



