I drift on past the islands, where the cedars troop down to the water’s edge, and the white birches lean far out over the rocks. The colors fade, the far line of the forests becomes a purple blur, and stars come out and hang in a dove-gray sky. I land at the little dock, safe hidden in the cove; I scramble along the dark trail to the house, while the loons are laughing and calling as they rock on the waves.
THE days are still warm, but autumn is surely here. The wasps are dying everywhere and lie in heaps on all the window-sills; the great water spiders have disappeared, and all day long the yellow leaves drift down silently, steadily, in the forests. Wreaths of vapor hang over the trees, and every wind brings the pungent fall odor of distant forest fires. The hillsides are a blaze of color, with basswoods a beautiful butter-yellow, oaks, russet and maroon and sugar maples, a flame of scarlet against the dark-green velvet of the cedars and hemlocks. Each birch stands forth, a slender Danæ, white feet in a drift of gold. The woods here on the island are thinning rapidly. All sorts of hidden dells and boulders are coming to light. Soon the whole island will lie open to the sight, and then there will no longer be anything mysterious about it.
Dried heads of goldenrod, life everlasting, and a few closed gentians are all that are left of the flowers; but the red and orange garlands of the bittersweet wave from every bush, the juniper berries are purple, and the sumacs are a wonder of great garnet velvet cones.
From a walk round the trails I bring in an assortment of seeds: beggar’s ticks, stick-seeds, Spanish needles, pitchforks—“the tramps of the vegetable world,” Burroughs calls them. They cover my skirt, they cling to my woolen leggings, they perch on the brim of my hat. Little pocket-shaped cases, pods with hooks, seeds shaped like tiny twin turtles, and furry balls like miniature chestnut burrs. As I pick and brush and tear them off I wish I knew what plants had fathered every one of them.
At the approach of cold weather the small animals and the few birds that are left draw nearer to the house. Grouse are in all the paths, flying up everywhere. They rise with a thrashing, pounding noise and soar away over the bushes, to settle again only a little further on. Last evening, at twilight, two of them came on the porch, the little cock ruffling it bravely, wings dragging, fantail spread, ruff standing valiantly erect. A hen followed sedately at his heels. They are very pretty, about the size of bantam chickens. How I hope that I shall be here to see their young in the spring!