84 THE FALL OF THE YEAR 



variegated with minute specks or spots," a species 

 I have never found here in my New England 

 woods. 



Nor have I ever suspected my red-backed salaman- 

 der of piping; though he may do it, as may the 

 angleworms, for aught I am able to hear, so filled 

 with whir of iron wheels are my dull ears. But listen ! 

 Something piping! Above the rustle of the leaves 

 we also hear a "fine plaintive" sound — no, a shrill 

 and ringing little racket, rather, a'bout the bigness 

 of a penny whistle. 



Dropping the rake, we cautiously follow up the 

 call — it seems to speak out of every tree trunk — and 

 find the piper clinging to a twig, no salamander at 

 all, but a tiny tree-frog, Pickering's hyla, his little 

 bagpipe blown almost to bursting as he tries to rally 

 the scattered summer by his tiny, mighty "skirl." 

 Take him nose and toes, he is surely as much as an 

 inch long, not very large to pipe against the north 

 wind turned loose in the leafless woods. 



We go back to our raking. Above us, among the 

 stones of the slope, hang bunches of Christmas fern; 

 around the foot of the trees we uncover trailing clus- 

 ters of gray-green partridge vine, glowing with crim- 

 son berries; we rake up the prince's pine, pipsissewa, 

 creeping Jennie, and wintergreen red with ripe ber- 

 ries, — a whole bouquet of evergreens, — exquisite, 

 fairy-like forms, that later shall gladden our Chrisfc 

 mas table. 



