ate as the drumming of the
partridge in the swamp, scarcely more than a stone's throw away.
Indeed it is less aloof, far less mysterious. Its raucous bellow
is soothed to a deep musical tone by distance. It speaks of the
human touch and the man-made whistle. I may measure, define, place
it; know the steamer that it speaks far and the man that pulls the
throttle cord. I may find the pitch, touch the identical note on
guitar or cornet. I have neither wind nor stringed instrument that
will record so low a note as that of the drumming of the
partridge. I count the vibrations of the first of it with ease.
They speed up toward the end, but they do not raise the pitch. I
know nothing in our human musical notation that will touch its
depth. Yet it is a musical tone and a most goblin-like and eerie
one. The partridge may be commonplace enough and his drumming but
a strut of complacency and self-satisfaction. With patience and
good luck I may see him doing it and follow him from his roost in
the morning till he returns to it at night. But I cannot fathom
the mystery which haunts the pasture in the genial melancholy of
these sunny October days, to which his drum seems to sound the
marching note.

In the midday stillness when the blue sky arches over the place
like a crystal bell which no winds may penetrate it seems as if
the witchery grew. The warmth of the sun is like that of summer
though without languor. The world is in a breathless swoon in the
midst of which I wonder dreamily how this soft brown grass on
which I lie could have been crisp and white with frost six hours
ago. The morning waked all the hardier forest creatures who seemed
to revel in the crisp exhilarating air. Red and gray squirrels
crashed about in the tree tops making noisy merriment in their
indescribable squirrel jargon. Their thrashing and chattering in
the trees was almost equal to a crowd of schoolboys nutting. With
them the blue jays blew trumpets and clanged bells, the
woodpeckers drummed and shrieked and crows and chewinks added to
the clamor. Even my chipmunks blew squeaky shrill whistles in
staccato notes. The pasture was full of picnic.

The drowse of noon seemed to put them all to sleep. The pond was
like glass and the black duck flock which had quacked noisily
there at daybreak and drawn white lines of ripples across its
black surface had gone south. Everywhere was silence.

Everywhere silence, indeed, but it was the silence only of the
slu