AUGUST DAYS 



sailing hawks. The young are now fully fledged, 

 and they love to circle and scream far above the 

 mountain's crest all the tranquil afternoon. Some- 

 times one sees them against the slowly changing 

 and swelUng thunder-heads that so often burden 

 the horizon at this season. 



It is on the dewy August mornings that one notices 

 the webs of the little spiders in the newly mown 

 meadows. They look like gossamer napkins spread 

 out upon the grass, — thousands of napkins far 

 and near. The farmer looks upon it as a sign of 

 rain; but the napkins are there every day; only a 

 heavier dew makes them more pronounced one 

 morning than another. 



Along the paths where my walks oftenest lead me 

 in August, in rather low, bushy, wet grounds, the 

 banner flower is a species of purple boneset, or trum- 

 pet-weed, so called, I suppose, because its stem is 

 hollow. It often stands up seven or eight feet high, 

 crowned with a great mass of dull purple bloom, and 

 leads the ranks of lesser weeds and plants like a 

 great chieftain. Its humbler servitors are white 

 boneset and swamp milkweed, while climbing bone- 

 set trails its wreaths over the brookside bushes not 

 far away. A much more choice and brilliant purple, 

 like some invasion of metropohtan fashion into a 

 rural congregation, is given to a near-by marsh by the 

 purple loosestrife. During the latter half of August 

 the bog is all aflame with it. There is a wonderful 

 209 



