NOVEMBER. 269 



with the general decay; and carefully strew them over 

 the beds of the flowers, to afford them a warm covering 

 and protection from the ungenial winter. The sere and 

 yellow leaves, eddying with the fitful breezes, fill up the 

 hollows of the pastures, where the slumbering lilies and 

 violets repose, and collect around the borders of the 

 woods, where the vernal flowers are sleeping, and re- 

 quire their warmth and protection. Thus nature 

 kindly guards the objects of her charge, from the evils 

 to which they are inevitably exposed, affording an 

 emblem of that providential care, which, though un- 

 seen, is always extended over us, to protect us from 

 those evils which misfortune or our own improvidence 

 may have created. 



As the month advances, the hoary aspect of winter 

 becomes more and more apparent over the face of the 

 landscape. The scarlet berries of the rose and the 

 prinos are conspicuous upon their leafless stems, and 

 the nests of birds, hitherto concealed, are disclosed to 

 observation by the absence of the foliage. The brown 

 fruit of the hazel is bending from its naked branches, 

 and the prickly globes of the chestnut are scattered 

 abundantly beneath its lofty boughs. The asters, 

 golden-rods, and other autumnal flowers, which a month 

 since were in all their splendor, now cover the plains 

 with a kind of hoary plumage, consisting of globular 

 heads of down, into which they have been transformed. 

 These downy wreaths are hardly less elegant than the 

 flowers, and form one of the most interesting appear- 

 ances of the landscape at the present time. The 

 plumed seeds of the thistle are sailing upon the wind, 

 and the feathery tassels of the clematis are hanging 

 from the vines, making a warm shelter for the birds in 

 their time of need. 



23* 



