The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-11-10
FALLING LEAVES.
With Silent .Eloquence They Tell the stor,
of Life and Death.

With Silent EfOqueRce They Tell the story
of Life and Death.
The sharp frosts have paved the way
for that annual mournful event. the
falling of the leaves. and we are even
now in the midst of the yearly sacrifice
to nature and to death.
In the springtirne the budding leaves
come in all their fresh young glory,
and hang in tender beauty on the par
ent branches. The progress of time
has given to these growth and develop
went, and soon we have stood beneath
the grateful shade of the new foliage
as the hot June sun beat down and
gave strength and life. Glorious in
colors; splendid in promise; hearty and
youthful and vigorous. the leaves
put out their sweet, perfect forms
and pleaded with Heaven, and the god
of the springtime. the sun. to give
them heat and warmth, and sturdily,
yet lovingly, gathered the sunbeams
and air, and throve and developed.
Then the fascination of youth hung
over all, and there seemed no death.
Life, life, spread shelteringly over each
umbra geous shade; life and force held
to every bursting bulb: the flowers
Joined the carnival, the sweet-voiccd
birds cooed their love songs in the
midsts of the grateful shades, and
builded their homes and joined in the
swelling chorus of life and it's delights.
The morning sun peeped in on their
homes and watched lovingly over the
mother bird as she paid her tribute of
patience to maternity. while on the
swinging bongh hard by, the song
of the feathered. happy husband
made its tiny contribution to the
universal stream of life and love and
hope. On every hand, leaf and grass,
howeret and bush and green-crowned
tree stood on the threshold of the year,
and he who saw the era of death yet to
come in the not distant future. saw
with eyes grown wise by experience,
and judged not by the present.
A brief month or two have passed.
The fervid heat Of summer has swept
slowly over the season. The sun rays
have grown intense and, later,
abated in their fervor. Disappoint-
ment sheltered behind the leaf and
sprang, full-grown into being. The
ice of the northland sent down its
frozen breath; the frost army stole
down in the night, and in the morning
the majesty of death displaced life.
Many-hued diadems crowned the
tree tops and their graceful
sides showed the glory of approaching
dissolution. Flaming scarlet lay inn
bedded in the deep green Of maturity,
and yellow and red tossed and glanced
in the autumnal sun. Perfection had
been reached, accompanied by its al
ways-present sisters-death and disso-
luton. Golden rod and stately fern
stood in the sorrowful, if beautiful,
procession, like mourners of hope, who
saw in death life to follow. The eye of
hope rests with these autumn senti-
nels, for they but foreshadow again
the endless return of the season of life.
Life precedes and follows death; death
follows, but precedes life. The veil of
autumn hangs over all; that modest
and dimly-seen haze, which perhaps
typifies that shadow which awaits
all our mortal eyes when we
shall approach the dark river
whose rolling tide sweeps ever on,
and into whose chill waters our reluc-
tant feet must inevita bly, tend, comes
sooner or later: that haze which glori.
fies the death of the leaf, and makes its
fall less sorrowful. Death is ever mer.
ciful. Whether it comes slowly to NOR
tai, ere the fixed time of development
and decay, or in the full plenitude OF
experience. when I'VE have known all
and thus known enough of this life and
are quite content to lay down our bur.
dens.
Death and life, Life and death, The
silently-hurtling leaf. it's mission full
filled and its existence spent. drops
gracefully and in multitude of com
panionship to Its waiting sepulchre. In
gorgeous colors and vieing with imagi-
nation in it's many shades, the heaped
embers of the joyous spring and golden
summer await the chill storms of the
autumn. SO with us. Our seasons trifie
longer perhaps, but as certain. Our
end as fixed and immutable Our
seeming lonely passage is in truth
joined by as many of our kind when
our time comes. and we, too. drop from
the limb of life. Whittier we go, and
why. still presents the same unsolva,
BILE mystery as when the race was
young. We know we go: only that.
We have hope, faith. belief. fond love
and ardent desire, but of the future we
know not. But 1--WE do know othat
nature covers the earth with brilliant,
many-colored cover for the winter OF
natures death, and so we may hope
that we. too. shall be of as much mo-
meut as the tiny leaf, whose brief life
we have watched for the past short
season. and whose demise and passage
from life now attracts our attention.
challenges our admiration arouses
perhaps our pity. but holds our knowl-
edge that after death comes life. and
that the springtime follows infallibly
the fall of the leaf. &C. C. Packard, in
Detroit Free Press.