AUTUMNAL SEEDS. 
351 
their evertrreen form, attracts the more attention. The abele- 
trees look oddly, with their fluttering leaves, silvery on one side, 
and gold-color on the reverse. 
A robin flew past us on the highway ; how often one meets them 
alone at this season, as if they had been left behind by their 
companions. 
Thursday, 2Qth. — Cloudy, but mild. Long drive by the lake 
shore. Sky, water, and fields alike gray. Woods getting bare, 
yet vivid touches of yellow here and there, the orange of the 
birch, or fighter yellow of the aspen, enlivening the deepening 
grays. The village still looks leafy from the distance, chiefly from 
its willows. We passed a group of fine native poplars, very large, 
and quite green still ; what is singular, a very large maple near 
them was also in full leaf, and partially green, though very many 
of its brethren are quite bare. These trees stood near the lake 
shore. The whole bank between the road and the water was still 
gay, with a fringe of underwood in color. Many asters of the 
common sorts were growing here, with golden-rods also, and a 
strawberry blite in crimson flower. The asters, and golden-rods, 
and nabali, and hawk-worts, along this bank have been innumera- 
ble through the season, and now that they are in seed, their 
downy heads look prettily mingled with the plants still in blos- 
som, and the bushes still in leaf ; the weather has been quiet, and 
the ripening blossoms, undisturbed by the wind, preserve the form 
of their delicate heads perfectly, some tawny, some gray, some 
silvery white, powdered flowers, as it were, like the powdered 
beauties of by-gone fashions. The pyramid golden-rod is really 
very pleasing in this airy, gossamer state. A large portion of our 
later flowers seem to ripen then seed in this manner. The gos- 
