A BIRTH-DAY SONG. 
AN AUTUMN GARLAND. 
Sunny, golden autumn, after the glaring heats of 
micl-summer, how welcome! Spring nor summer can¬ 
not match these charming September mornings and 
October afternoons. The sun runs high no longer, but 
comes in aslant under the trees and lights up everything 
with a golden glow. We are glad the tropic heat is 
past; but we stretch out our hands and try to grasp 
the delicious warmth of this autumu weather, fearing 
it will not last. Yet we have to thank that fervent 
summer sun for all which gladdens us now—these wide 
emerald fields, these leafy bowers, this rich luxuriance 
of fruit. It was that sultry fervency that brought 
the green into the leaves, and the gay colors to the 
flowers, and the soft ripeness into the fruit. Kindly 
fall the slanting rays now greeting the nodding Golden- 
Rod, purpling the grapes upon the wall, giving another 
warm touch to the red sides of the apples, another 
yellow glow to the pumpkins and squashes. 
How beautiful are the rich landscapes spread out be¬ 
fore our eyes ! Joseph’s coat of many colors is outvied 
by the variegated hues of field and forest. There is a 
splendor, an imperial royalty in our northern autumn, 
which makes the other seasons seem tame. There is an 
appropriateness, a fitness, in the ancient symbol which 
gives to winter the form of a stern Titan, to spring the lithe 
robustness of an Apollo, to summer the grace of a Hebe, 
while autumn has the majesty and maturity of a Juno. 
Autumn is queen of the seasons, a tiara-crowned em 
press, whose glowing robes of red and purple and saf¬ 
fron rival all the vaunted products of Babylonian or 
Tyrian looms. She reigns supreme, and in her realm 
are perpetual rest and beauty and tenderness. 
There is no exhausting heat, no burning sunshine, as 
we wander forth into the “ happy autumn fields.” The 
grass is still soft and green, the vines are still hanging 
in full, rich clusters along the roadsides. From the 
orchards float a sweet-apple odor. Tall Cat-tails stretch 
up their sceptered heads from the brookside, and the 
drooping, fleecy Clematis clamber the fences and hedges. 
Golden-Rods, the same that peered over the stone walls 
in the last days of August, yet nod to us in these still, 
October days, climbing up higher and higher in a thick 
tangle of greenness; for these autumn flowers do not 
hurry away, as did the-delicate Anemones—the wind 
flo ivers,—opening to the breeze, then floating off upon 
its zephyrs. They are all stout, vigorous herbs that do 
not care when the warm days of September give way 
to chill and cold, and the bright afternoons suddenly 
fall into damp evenings. And these fall afternoons are 
short, though charming; the sun sinks down at once 
and it is night, before we are aware the day is gone. 
But our wandering has not been in vain. Our arms 
are full of drooping vines, bright colors and feathery 
waves—wild flower spoils of the fields and the woods— 
