Manchester Democrat., 1921-10-05
OCTOBER.

tF'rom the Cedar Rapids, Republican,
Keats and Shelley and our own
Herbert Carruth had the right idea
of early autumn. Keats sang of the
season of mists and yellow fruitful
ness, close bosom-friend of the ma,
turing sun, 'and Shelley in his match
less "Ode to the West Wind" has
painted a deathless picture upon
which all generations will love to
linger. But Divine Manifestations"
which SENS to have been written
long, long time ago, and later re-
christened Each in His own
Tongue" seems to fit the autumn
season SO perfectly because of its
second stanza, that this is the sea-
son when men most strangely feel
its truth. Nearly everyone who
loves the out-of-doors must be famil-
lar with these lines from the pen of
William Herbert Carruth:
A haze on the far horizon,
An infinite, tender sky.
The rich, ripe tints OF the corn-fields,
And the wild.gees sailing high;
~1ha GIL ofCl upidhu anu lOW tduu, 4
The charm of the golden-rod,-
Some Of us call il Autumn,
And others call it God.
Perhaps the latter half is hardly
accurate for this part of Iowa, for
the charm Of the golden rod has gone,
and we see instead few of the very
latest of the brook sunfowers, glow
ing like gold in the October sunlight
and find, if we~are SO fortunate as TO
know where to look, little patch of
the lovely fringed genations, vying in
their rich depth of color with the
great blue unattainable flower of the,
sky. In the gardens there are yet
petunias, with some late roses and
these give us every day the humble
bees and humming birds and every
evening moths of strange habit and
chastened beauty.
And the birds have arrived from
the north to tell us that the summer
has gone and the winter is coming. |
but that they have come to remain
with us and to cheer us so that we
need not grieve. The slate-colored |
juncoes, and the purple finches have
come down during the past week and
their pleasing notes mingle with the
chatter of the migrants like the win
ter wren and the myrtle warbler,
with an occasional clear whistle from
the white throated sparrow, telling
Peabody now as they did in the
spring to Sow wheat, SOW wheat Pea
body" 1t must be they know of both |
the spring and the winter wheat. |
Flocks of kinglets are Hsping in the |
apple trees, drcves of blackbirds rise /
like clouds from the cornfields, the
catbird is still in the lilac, bluebirds
and robins come to the shrubbery for
berries.
But we are likly to forget both |
the birds and the few remaining
flowers in the great glory of color
which is peculiar to October. 1t is
with measureless delight that we
now roam the fields and woods or |
linger along the country lanes. Here |
and there is a hard maple on the |
slope of deep ravine, in whose |
shelving foliage all the glory of the
summer sunsets have been stored by
wondrous alchemy to break forth |
in startling beauty in October and /
make this month the ruby of the
years carcanet. The sumac flames
along the fences, the tops of the ash
tees are purpling into the first tone
of that wonderful autumnal series /
which lightens from day to day like
the Frightening beams of morn Here
and there little wild cherry glows
scarlet on sunlit hillside and yon-
der the virginian creeper rises like
a pillar of divine fire up the stately
trunk of one of the tallest oaks. The
elms and the poplars, the hickories
ano the walnuts are giving us gold
and orange, russet and brown, even