1909
Sept 20-27
(No 4)
  I am assured by people familiar with this region that
most of its deciduous trees turn yellow or gold before the
fall of the leaf. This change of coloring is said to occur about
the middle of October. As yet there are comparatively few signs
of it. The foliage of the oaks as [is] almost as deep & uniform
green as in midsummer. That of the sycamore maples is almost
equally unchanged although some of the leaves are edged with rusty
brown. The birch leaves are yellowing in places, however,
and some of the late chestnut foliage is golden or even
coppery in tint. The only really vivid coloring is afforded
by the Virginia Creeper & the Japanese Ivy which are decked
in scarlet, crimson & gold quite as brilliant as anything
we can see at home. About the Lake shores & on the
islands I see bushes overhanging the water where foliage
is of a subdued mulberry red. What they are I do not
know as I have been unable to examine them closely.
The brakes on the mountain sides are very generally dull
yellow now giving to the steep slopes, over wide areas,
the appearance of being strongly bathed in sunlight where
no sun is shining.
Autumn coloring.
  Altogether the autumn coloring just at present is
insignificant in depth and amount to what one would
be sure to find anywhere in New England at this season.
I suspect that the difference is due not so much to
climatic differences as to differences in the vegetation, in
other words it seems probably that British trees
are not given, under any conditions, to assuming bright
colors & that many of the American ones would be
quite as brilliant here, if introduced, as they are in
their native land. The former certainly do not turn much when
grown in New England whereas the woodbine is as brilliant here as there.