Reflections. 131 



and the longer the tramp, the sharper our eyes become, 

 and vivid is the mental picture we carry away. One of 

 the chief advantages in visiting different meadows and pieces 

 of woodland, is, that it whets our perception, we are more on 

 the look out. But probably there isn't a ten acre wood- 

 lot even near home, that has been thoroughly explored. 

 If you think there is, go through it again, and see if there 

 isn't a nut tree, that you have before passed by without 

 discovery. 



It is often well to select some circumscribed piece of 

 mother earth, and watch it particularly throughout the 

 year; comparing it with the other fields to which occa- 

 sional journeys are made. The rhythm of the warmer 

 months is broken by scattering our observation too wide. 

 There is a cadence of the year; one continuous song 

 changing gradually and almost imperceptibly, and of 

 which each musical creature sings in turn his part. The 

 first outburst of melody of the song-sparrow, the black 

 birds in the swamp, the crickets, the katy-dids, the z-ing 

 of the harvest flies, and the late fall notes of the birds 

 going southward; these and many more, all come as signs 

 of the seasons, and mark for each patch of mother earth, 

 the progress of the year. They make a beautiful and 

 pathetic march, and are best seen and most forcibly im- 

 pressed, by looking steadily at the same acres. If we stand 

 with open eyes, there is no pageant so varied as the march 

 of the warmer days. But the rapid change that charac- 

 terizes Summer is gone in Winter. There may be snow or 

 there may be none, but we have generally to look close to 

 note that a few more dead leaves have blown off an oak 



