SUNDOWN 
1 39 
with the crocuses; and, in any case, these are more 
easily protected than where they are sparsely set. 
Those, however, who are unwilling to make a few 
sacrifices in order to reap the benefits of February and 
March, and scruple to abolish the roller from Christ¬ 
mas-time onwards, were best left to the enjoyment of 
their immaculate and barren lawns. I, for my part, 
have room and to spare in my affections for beauty in 
any guise, and can rejoice in the smooth-shaven sward 
as well as in a space of lawn fecund and prodigal of 
stranger blooms. 
The low sun makes the colour. We are past the 
season of equinoctials, and the winds have done their 
worst in the orchard-—the fruit is safe in the loft, and 
the year is left to die by itself. Yet at times there 
rises in one a wonder, a hope, half a faith, that here 
is spring again—the phantom truly of false morning. 
The slow and gradual decline of this year, with its 
soft melancholy, has aided the deception. I hear the 
piping of the robin across the emptying garden—the 
trees begin to show thin and ragged, and I see the bare 
boughs breaking out into view once more. But this 
morning I heard the tit also, singing as though May 
were back again and the long silences of the summer 
had never been. The sap is sinking in the trees, one 
knows too well; but the birds have been deceived, like 
the flowers, and in the audience of their song it is 
possible to dream that it is spring. Almost I thought 
I heard the blackbird; but, alas, he is still silent. 
None so generous as the thrush, who is often wont to 
trill in December, and is never later than February; 
