The Rambles of an Idler 



If a thought of approaching winter intrudes 

 at all it is when, on our homeward stretch, we 

 hear the feeble song of mole-crickets still un- 

 subdued by frost, A vain protest this, that 

 frost should come at all, and a trace of sorrow 

 overshadows us. Or, it may be, a solitary katy- 

 did struggles desperately to assert once more 

 that the mythical "Katy" really "did," but 

 gets no further than the name. I was amused, 

 yet genuinely sorry, to hear again and again an 

 ineffectual Ka» — Ka and then silence that was 

 really sad. The few survivors of October's 

 "killing" frosts, as they are called, have, in- 

 deed, a hard time of it, but never are they so 

 conspicuous as really to mar the remaining 

 glories of a clear, nut-brown November day. 



He trode the unplanted forest floor, whereon 

 The all-seeing sun for ages hath not shone. 



I, too, tread the forest floor to-day, but not 

 as did he to whom Emerson refers. I can no- 

 where walk in one direction without reaching 

 the scarred surface of the earth, where the plow 

 and spade nave obliterated Nature 's handiwork. 

 Thankful for the little that remains, I walk in 

 circles about a few old trees, looking up at the 



230 



