142 FROM SPRING TO FALL. 



tracts are completely flattened, to spring up again 

 when the force of the rush is over. It is, in fact, 

 for the time, a waving grey-green sea of vegetation. 

 Cloud masses, blown to rags and tatters, of a lurid 

 tint, move in a slanting direction — for it is impos- 

 sible for them to go in front of the gale — to mass 

 themselves again when they have sailed into a 

 calmer current of air. A few late rooks — for some 

 of them do keep late hours — in trying to get to their 

 rookery below the hills, are blown away like withered 

 leaves. 



"What do ye think on it all?" cries a rustic 

 friend that I had not noticed, from a side track 

 leading out of the firs. " Middlin' lively, ain't it ? 

 The young uns an' the old gals wunt want to hook 

 no dead boughs and limbs off fur fagits, seein' as 

 'tis done fur 'em, an' a lot o' live stuff is down as 

 well. 'Tis a werry ill wind as don't do good fur 

 sum critter or other. I knowed it was comin', fur 

 the hosses, ponies, cattle, and sheep made for the 

 loo'ard hollers, long afore five o'clock this arternoon. 

 Them 'ere hollies on the brow, them 'ere big uns, 

 swishes and ristles most spitefully, I ken tell ye. 

 An' look here, there's a couple o' cocks under 'em 



