But a day arrives when even newspaper coddling is of no avail. Sometimes it is in late September, sometimes not until October, but when it comes there is no resisting.
The sun goes down, leaving a clear sky paling to green at the horizon. A still cold falls upon the world, and I feel that it is the end. Shears in hand, I cut everything I can—nasturtiums down to the ground,—leaves, buds, and all,—feathery sprays of cosmos, asters by the armful. Those last bouquets that I bring into the house are always the most beautiful, for I do not have to save buds for later cutting. There will, alas, be no later cutting.
So I fill my bowls and vases, and next morning I go out, well knowing what I shall see. It is a beautiful sight, too, if one can forget its meaning. The whole golden-green world of autumn has been touched with silver. In the low-lying swamp beyond the orchard it is almost like a light snowfall. The meadows rising beyond the barns are silvered over wherever the long tree-shadows still lie. And in my garden, too, where the shadows linger, every leaf is frosted, but as soon as the sun warms them through, leaf and twig turn dark and droop to the ground. It is the end.
Except, indeed, for my brave marigolds and calendulas and little button asters. It is for this reason that I have given them space all summer, nipping them back when they tried to blossom early, for they seem a bit crude compared with the other flowers. But now that frost is here, my feelings warm to them. I cannot criticize their color and texture, so grateful am I to them for not giving up. And when last night’s cuttings have faded, I shall be very glad of a glowing mass of marigold beside my fireplace, and of the yellow stars of calendula, like embodied sunshine, on my dining-table.
Well, then, the frost has come! And after the first pang of realization, I find that, curiously enough, the worst is over. Since it has come, let it come! And now—hurrah for the garden house-cleaning! The garden is dead—the garden of yesterday! Long live the garden—the garden of to-morrow! For suddenly my mind has leaped ahead to spring.
I can hardly wait for breakfast to be over, before I am out in working clothes, pulling up things—not weeds now, but flowers, or what were flowers. Nasturtiums, asters, cosmos, snapdragon, stock, late-blooming cornflowers—up they all come, all the annuals, and the biennials that have had their season. I fling them together in piles, and soon have small haystacks all along my grass paths, and—there I am! Down again to the good brown earth!