104 
NATURE STUDY. 
A Lesson of the Autumn Days. 
BY SUSY C. FOGG. 
A member of our Institute has said, “ I always try to see 
some good and beauty in things I see every day.” Is this 
motto not worthy of thought, and possible for every one living 
in a city of the size of ours ; and where may we seek for a 
greater or more constant charm than in the coloring of all 
things about us, for we live in a world of color, marvellously 
beautiful! 
The birds will not always sing in our city streets, the flowers 
cannot grow there ; but we always have, and cannot get away 
from, some remnant of glory in tree or sky, or even the sunshine 
against the shadow ; and if we go outside the town, our eyes 
analyze the landscape till they become satiated with color, and 
our whole being is aglow with its mystery and delight, and we 
feel with the artist, who said, “ If I should paint my pictures 
in half as brilliant tones as I really see my subjects, no one 
would think them natural.” In the autumn we need make no 
search, but are impressed with the beauty of color on every 
side. It was a pretty fancy of the good pastor who, some time 
since, told his congregation of how the torch was first lighted 
among the soft maples in the lowlands, and the flame spread 
until it climbed the hillsides, the maples still being in the lead, 
and then the harder woods, the beeches and the royal oaks, put 
on the scarlet and the purple, till all the country side was ablaze 
with color. “This is not the sad season, but the miracle play 
of all the year.” 
At sunset, on the day of November third, our western sky was 
a fine mesh of clouds, which glowed for a long time like live 
coals, and the beauty of the delicate tracery of the bare, brown 
limbs of our city trees against the sky must be seen, not de¬ 
scribed. This was followed by a similar display on the succeed¬ 
ing night, the intense, glowing red being replaced by a golden 
glory. 
But the color picture which lingers is not always so striking 
