1 86 Twelve Months With 



Henry Abbey writes in the same vein : 



"An icy hand is on the land; 

 The cloudy sky is sad and gray;" — 



The predominant note with most of the poets 

 has been that the month at best was gray and dead. 

 Bird lovers and nature students know better. 

 November has as much color and as many birds as 



July. 



Some of the poets, like Edna Dean Proctor, take 

 a more hopeful view : 



"This is the summer's burial-time; 

 She died when dropped the earliest leaves; 

 And cold upon her rosy prime, 

 Fell down the autumn's frosty rime; 

 Yet I am not as one that grieves, 



For well I know o'er sunny seas 

 The blue bird waits for April skies; 

 And at the roots of forest trees 

 The May-flowers sleep in fragrant ease. 

 And violets hide their azure eyes." 



Amos Bryant Russell writes these fine lines of 

 the late warm days of November: 



"A wave of summer's overflow, 

 A fugitive which went astray, 

 That on its passage lost its way; 

 A prelude to an autumn dirge. 

 An interlude on winter's verge, 



