earth and sky. "One seems to get nearer to nature
in the early spring days," says Mr. Burroughs. I think not, not if by
nearer you mean closer to the heart and meaning of things. "All
screens are removed, the earth everywhere speaks directly to you; she
is not hidden by verdure and foliage." That is true; yet for most of
us her lips are still dumb with the silence of winter. One cannot come
close to bare, cold earth. There is only one flat, faded expression on
the face of the fields in March; whereas in October there is a settled
peace and sweetness over all the face of Nature, a fullness and a
non-withholding in her heart that makes communication natural and
understanding easy.

The sap is sinking in the trees, the great tides of life have turned,
but so slowly do they run these soft and fragrant days that they seem
almost still, as at flood. A blue jay is gathering acorns overhead,
letting one drop now and then to roll out of sight and be planted under
the mat of leaves. Troops of migrating warblers flit into and through
the trees, talking quietly among themselves as they search for food,
moving all the while--and to a fixed goal, the far-off South.
Bob-white whistles from the fodder-field; the odor of ripened fox
grapes is brought with a puff of wind from across the pasture; the
smell of mint, of pennyroyal, and of sweet fern crisping in the sun.
These are not the odors of death; but the fragrance of life's very
essence, of life ripened and perfected and fit for storing till another
harvest comes. And these flitting warblers, what are they but another
sign of promise, another proof of the wisdom which is at the heart of
things? And all this glory of hickory and oak, of sumac and creeper,
of burning berries on dogwood and ilex and elder--this sunset of the
seasons--but the preparation for another dawn?

If one would be folded to the breast of Nature, if one would be pressed
to her beating heart, if one would feel the mother in the soul of
things, let these October days find him in the hills, or where the
river makes into some vast salt marsh, or underneath some ancient tree
with fields of corn in shock and browning pasture slopes that reach and
round themselves along the rim of the sky.

The sun circles warm above me; and up against the snowy piles of cloud
a broad-winged hawk in lesser circles wheels and flings its piercing
cry far down to me; a fat, dozy woodchuck sticks his head out and eyes
me kindly