S28 
RURAL HOURS. 
is given up to its labors, and it is only the very last sheaves which 
are gathered in September. Yet hear what Spenser says : 
" Then came the Automne, all in yellow clad, 
As though she joyed in her plenteous store. 
Laden with fruit that made her laugh full glad ; 
Upon her head a wreath, which was enrolde 
With eares of come of every sort, she bore. 
And in her hand a sickle she did holdo, 
To reap the ripened fruits the earth did yolde." 
The ears of corn, and the sickle, were certainly the rightful 
property of Summer, who had already been spending weeks in 
the harvest-field. 
Thomson first introduces the season in very much the same 
livery as Spenser, as we may all remember : 
" Grown'd with the dcUe, and the wheatcn sheaf, 
While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain, 
Comes jovial on ; 
broad and brown, below. 
Extensive harvests hang the heavy head : — " 
In classic days Spring wtiS seen crowned with flowers ; Summer 
with grain ; Autumn with fruits ; and Winter with reeds. All 
the four seasons, the Anni of Roman mythology, took a mascu- 
line form. Traces of this may be found in tlie gender given to 
the different seasons, grammatically speaking, in the principal 
modern tongues of Europe, for they are chiefly masculine. In 
Italian, spring, la primavera, is feminine; V estate, Vautumno, Vin- 
verno, are masculine ; in verse, il verno is occasionally used for 
winter ; and the gender of summer is sometimes changed to a 
feminine substantive, la state. In German, der Friihling, der 
Sommcr, der Winter, der lArhst, are all masculine, and so is the 
