WHILE AUTUMN LINGERS 153 



and true of the everyday plan was at our doors. Autumn 

 is a season for thinking over, and the good company of 

 the sunflowers has been the reason for moralizing. 



The neighbor who planted a screen of sunflowers along 

 his chicken yard is rejoicing now. The hens themselves 

 cluck of seeds to come, and the cock has mounted the 

 fence post to herald the news abroad. Any one who 

 sowed a seed in the spring has a smile of satisfaction at 

 the sunflower prodigality. The lesser members of the 

 tribes helianthus, the coreopsis, goldenglow, calliopsis, 

 calendulas, and the rudbeckias and marigolds, take a 

 second start in life if the shears have been used on their 

 faded bloom and superfluous growths snipped away. 



Yellow is the color of sunshine and happiness, and at 

 the beginning of the fall of the year, when we are think- 

 ing of winter, the yellows shed glory everywhere. Where 

 masses appear in the border, the purple asters seem more 

 royal, the blood red of the lobelia cardinalis takes a 

 warmer hue, and the whites of nicotinas, cosmos, and 

 little asters are snowy in contrast. 



The sunflowers and their allies play leading parts in 

 the pageant of September. While there is a similarity in 

 the character of ray flowers, there are differences in wood- 

 land grace, a lavishness of bloom as if every plant was 

 trying to outdo its neighbor in flowering. 



There are signs of a second childhood in the vigorous 

 ambition of the sweet alyssum to make white ribbons, and 



