blows roughly, and the leaves are rudely torn from the trees where
they have gladdened us through the spring and the summer by their
refreshing shade, their modest beauty, and their sweet music, as they
sung to the gentle breeze which played amid the branches. They lie
now, most of them, beneath the trees, wrinkled and faded, or scattered
here and there, far from their fellows, wherever the cold blast has
wafted them.

The birds have been taught by their unfailing instinct that summer has
departed, and winter is near. They no more warble their rich melodies,
or flit in and out of the bowery recesses of the honeysuckles or peep
with knowing look under the eaves, or into the arbour. Other purposes
prompt to other acts, and they are taking their farewell of the
pleasant summer haunts, where they have built their nests and reared
their young.

This morning, soon after sunrise, Willie was standing on the lawn,
contemplating the beauties of nature, and thinking, I suppose, of the
changes of the seasons, when all at once I heard him shout, "Look at
the birds! Look at the birds!" We threw open the window, and there
were thousands and thousands of them almost over our heads. Their
wings made a noise like the rushing of a steam-engine as it cleaves
the air in its speed. They were calling to each other with a short,
quick sound. It seemed as if they were giving and receiving orders. We
watched them till they disappeared over the tree-tops.

"There are more! There are more!" shouted Mary. We again looked
towards the rising sun, and up over the eastern hills came another
immense flock, calling to each other as the first, and they too
disappeared behind the western hills.

"There is another flock!" and so indeed there was. Up from the meadows
and over the hills they came, swaying up and down in their flight, and
so near that we could see each bird distinctly. Almost simultaneously
they alighted on Clover Hill to rest for a moment. I can never forget
their motion so full of grace and beauty, waving and undulating like
the gentle swell of the ocean. Soon, another company followed in the
same direction, and when they were over Clover Hill, up flew the
others, and away they went with them beyond our sight. Flock after
flock appeared, each taking the same general direction, and some of
them so large that they stretched from the hills which bounded our
view on one side, as far as our eye could see on the other. They
looked, as Willi