of the strong life of earth that blossoms in every flower as it comes, and expends its supreme splendours in the forests as they resign their ripened foliage to the moisture and the movement of the forces of the skies. There have been days when Keats's lines on the English autumn have been so true that at least there springs to the memory that first musical line, "Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness." In years when the New England October is more characteristic, keen and shining and bold in breeze and colour, there is no such provocation to quote Keats. The first glories, indeed, have not returned. That taking audacity of the early sumachs and the flaming maples which won all admiring eyes, is no more. Many a maple is yet coruscant with scarlet and blood-red, and lesser plants of lower stature yet glorify the thickets and the undergrowth; but now it is the magnificence of the oaks, which colour the hills and the long stretches of groves along the plains, that gives quality to the aspect of Nature. Grandeur, and in truth a somber grandeur, marks the landscape. It is like the purview of a life, which, spending its exquisite and poetic lightness in the realm of youth, and giving zest, pursuit and spirit to its mature years, closes with dignity, majesty and depth of feeling, and prophesies immortal powers. The strong and sturdy oak is that enduring symbol of aged force, which contains the earnest of eternity. And when that, too, passes, there remain the hemlocks, pines and spruces, and the vital cedars, that can subsist for centuries on the mere trickle of rains on the cleft rocks, these in the bare forests will still uplift their vivid or their solemn greens, and the wind that plays within their boughs as upon giant harps brings forth the superb rhythms of continuous praise. All How full are the fields and forests of this hold on life! Not for the moment is anything in Nature born. It is true that life never ceases. these living things which have made the beauty of the earth do not supinely rest in winter. Note how the buds swell on the birches; how the arbutus buds are all ready for spring even now; how the azalea and the laurel give the same tokens. Note how the foot leaves of a thousand humble plants spread themselves on the kindly ground, and keep life for the flower stalks of the spring or summer. And in such a fall as this, note how the young seedlings of the year hurry into bloom, to greet the wooing gentleness of the southern zephyrs. On a recent walk over mountain and valley a company of lovers of Nature made note of 56 species of wild flowers in full bloom; among them the wild strawberry, the deerberry-most beautiful of all its family, whose name recalls the days when deer were as familiar in the forest as gray squirrels are in Springfieldthe herb robert, the evening primrose, the canina violet, the Deptford pink, seven or eight species of aster, four or five of golden-rod, the Queen Anne's lace to represent the parsleys, and others that may await naming. The charm of Indian summer, which has so overtaken and conquered us all, may not last long; but while it lasts it is incomparable in these miraculous suggestions of the underlying vitality and ongoing force of the Spirit which has made all this earth and through it expresses himself. If God did not constantly evolve life out of life, he would not live. It is God who speaks in the unending glory of the seasons. All the poets know it, and have known it, for they are informed of him. The seasons are the type of God, wherewith he prints before his dullard children on his "three mighty leaves, earth, ocean, sky," the rune of "might, justice, love." And the greatest of these is love. Flowers in November Bloom T The HE fifty-six flower species found in bloom in the walk noted above deserve to be specified, as showing the extraordinary grace of this lingering warmth of autumn. walk was from the south peak of Mount Tom for some miles northward along the ridge, then still northward down the mountain and through the valley between it and Little Tom, and so across to Smith's Ferry, thus compassing a considerable variety of conditions. The flowers found were as follows, according to Gray, but not the latest edition of that standard botany, which is not at hand, so that some variations will be noted: Sinapis arvensis (charlock, wild mustard); arabis lyrata (low rock cress); lepidium virginicum (peppergrass-properly pepper-cress); cerastium viscosum (mouse-ear chickweed); polygala sanguinea (milkwort); desmodium canadense (tick trefoil); geum album (white wood tick); hamamelis virginica (witch hazel); oenothera biennis (evening primrose); viola canina (the light blue |