Chapter V: Part 5

We shall find those pretty wayside Shrubberies, the Hedge-rows, and the Field-flower-borders that lie beneath and about them, less gay with new green, and less fantastic with flowers, than they have lately been; but they still vie with the Garden both in sweetness and in beauty. The new flowers they put forth this month are but few. Among these are the pretty little Meadow Scabious, with its small purple head standing away from its leaves; the various Goosefoots, curious for their leaves, feeling about like fingers for the fresh air; the Camomile, shooting up its troops of little suns, with their yellow centres and white rays; and a few more of lesser note. But, in addition to these, we have still many which have already had their greeting from us, _or should have had_; but really, when one comes every month, self-invited, to Nature's morning levees, and meets there flocks of flowers, every one of which claims as its single due a whole morning's attention, it must not be taken as unkind or impolite by any of them, if, in endeavouring hastily to record the company we met, for the benefit of those who were not there, we should chance to forget some who may fancy themselves quite as worthy of having their presence recorded, and their court dresses described, as those who do figure in this Court Calendar of Nature. It is possible, too, that we may have fallen into some slight errors in regard to the places of residence of some of our fair flowery friends, and the particular day on which they first chose to make their appearance at Nature's court; for we are not among those reporters who take short-hand notes, or any other, but such as write themselves in the tablet of our memory. But if any lady _should_ feel herself aggrieved in either of the above particulars, she has only to drop us a leaf to that effect, stating, at the same time, her name and residence, and she may be assured that we shall take the first opportunity of paying our personal respects to her, and shall have little doubt of satisfying her that our misconduct has arisen from any thing rather than a wilful neglect towards her pretensions, or a want of taste in appreciating them. In the mean time let us add, that, in addition to the new company which graces this month's levee, the following are still punctual in their attendance; namely, Woodbine, Woodruff, Meadow-sweet, and Wild Thyme; (N. B. These ladies are still profuse in their use of perfumes); and, among those who depend on their beauty alone, Eyebright, Pansie, the lesser and greater Willow-herb, Daisy, two or three of the Orchises, Hyacinth, several sisters of the Speedwell and Pimpernel families, and the scentless Violet.

Now, after the middle of the month, commences that great rural employment to which all the hopes of the farmer's year have been tending; but which, unhappily, the mere labourer has come to regard with as much indifference as he does any of those which have successively led to it. This latter is not as it should be. But as we cannot hope to alter, let us not stay to lament over it. On the contrary, let us rejoice that at least Nature remains uninjured--that _she_ shows more beautiful than ever at harvest time, whether Man chooses to be more happy then or not. It is true Harvest-home has changed its moral character, in the exact proportion that the people among whom it takes place have changed _theirs_, in becoming, from an agricultural, a mechanical and manufacturing nation; and we may soon expect to see the produce of the earth gathered in and laid by for use, almost without the intervention of those for whose use it is provided, and in supplying whose wants it is chiefly consumed: for the rich, so far from being "able to live by bread alone," would scarcely feel the loss if it were wholly to fail them. But Nature is not to be changed by the devices which man employs to change and deteriorate himself. She has willed that the scenes attendant on the gathering in of her gifts shall be as fraught with beauty as ever. And accordingly, Harvest time is as delightful to look on to _us_, who are mere spectators of it, as it was in the Golden Age, when the gatherers and the rejoicers were one. Now, therefore, as then, the Fields are all alive with figures and groups, that seem, in the eye of the artist, to be made for pictures--pictures that he can see but one fault in; (which fault, by the bye, constitutes their only beauty in the eye of the farmer;) namely, that they will not stand still a moment, for him to paint them. He must therefore be content, as we are, to keep them as studies in the storehouse of his memory.

Here are a few of those studies, which he may practise upon till doomsday, and will not then be able to produce half the effect from them that will arise spontaneously on the imagination, at the mere mention of the simplest words which can describe them:--The sunburnt Reapers, entering the Field leisurely at early morning, with their reaphooks resting on their right shoulders, and their beer-kegs swinging to their left hands, while they pause for a while to look about them before they begin their work.--The same, when they are scattered over the Field: some stooping to the ground over the prostrate Corn, others lifting up the heavy sheaves and supporting them against one another, while the rest are plying their busy sickles, before which the brave crop seems to retreat reluctantly, like a half-defeated army.--Again, the same collected together into one group, and resting to refresh themselves, while the lightening keg passes from one to another silently, and the rude clasp-knife lifts the coarse meal to the ruddy lips.--Lastly, the piled-up Wain, moving along heavily among the lessening sheaves, and swaying from side to side as it moves; while a few, whose share of the work is already done, lie about here and there in the shade, and watch the near completion of it.

I would fain have to describe the boisterous and happy revelries that used to ensue upon these scenes, and should do still. And what if they were attended by mirth a little over-riotous, or a few broken crowns? Better so, than the troops of broken spirits that now linger amidst the overflowing plenty of the last Harvest-field, and begin to think where they shall wander in search of their next week's bread.

But no more of this. Let us turn at once to a few of the other occurrences that take place in the open Fields during this month. The Singing Birds are, for the most part, so busy in educating and providing for their young broods, that they have little time to practise their professional duties; consequently this month is comparatively a silent one in the Woods and Groves. There are some, however, whose happy hearts will not let them be still. The most persevering of these is that poet of the skies, the Lark. He still pours down a bright rain of melody through the morning, the mid-day, and the evening skies, till the whole air seems sparkling and alive with the light of his strains.--His sweet-hearted relation, the Woodlark, also still warbles high up in the warm evening air, and occasionally even at midnight--hovering at one particular spot during each successive strain.--The Goldfinch, the Yellowhammer, and the Green and Brown Linnet, those pretty flutterers among the summer leaves,--as light hearted and restless as they,--still keep whistling snatches of their old songs, between their quick fairy-like flittings from bough to bough. As for the solitary Robin, his delicate song may be heard all through the year, and is peculiarly acceptable now in the neighbourhood of human dwellings--where no other is heard, unless it be the common wren's.

By the middle of this month we shall lose sight entirely of that most airy, active, and indefatigable of all the winged people,--the Swift--Shakespeare's "temple-haunting Martlet." Unlike the rest of its tribe, it breeds but once in the season; and its young having now acquired much of their astonishing power of wing, young and old all hurry away together--no one can tell whither. The sudden departure of the above singular species of the Swallow tribe, at this very moment, when every thing seems to conform together for their delight,--when the winds (which they shun) are hushed--and the Summer (in which they rejoice) is at its best--and the air (in which they feed) is laden with dainties for them--and all the troubles and anxieties attendant on the coming of their young broods are at an end, and they are wise enough not to think of having more;--that, at the very moment when all these favourable circumstances are combining together to make them happy, they should suddenly, and without any assignable cause whatever, disappear, and go no one knows whither, is one of those facts, the explanation of which has hitherto baffled all our inquiring philosophizers, and will continue to do so while the said inquirers continue to judge of all things by analogies invented by their own boasted _reason_: as if reason were given us to explain instinct! and as if a being which passes its whole life on the wing--(for sleep is not a part of life, and the Swift, during its waking hours, never sets foot on tree or ground--almost realizing that fabled bird which has wings but no feet) were not likely to be gifted with any senses but such as _we_ can trace the operations of! The truth is, all that we can make of this mysterious departure is, to accept it as an omen--the earliest, the most certain, and yet the least attended to, because it happens in the midst of smiling contradictions to it--that the departure of Summer herself is nigh at hand.

It is not good to cull out the sad points of reflection which present themselves, in the various subjects which come before us, in contemplating the operations of Nature. But as little is it good, studiously to avoid those points. Perhaps the only wise course is, to let them suggest what they will, of sadness or of joy; and then, so to receive and apply those suggestions, that even the sad ones themselves may be made subservient to good. To me, this early departure, in the very heart of our summer, of the most bird-like of all the birds that visit us only for a season, always comes at first like an omen of evil, that I cannot doubt, and yet will not believe. It might as well be told me, that the being who sits beside me now, in all the pomp of health, and all the lustre of loveliness, will leave me to-morrow, and go--like the bird--I know not whither. And yet, if such a prediction _were_ made to me, what should I do in regard to it, but (as one ought in the case of the omen of departing summer) to _believe_ that it is true, and yet _feel_ that it is false; and, acting upon the joint impulse thus created, enjoy the blessing tenfold, while it remains mine, and leave the lamentations for its loss till I can no longer feel the delight that flows from its presence?

But, enough of philosophy--even of that which is intended to cure us of philosophizing. Let us get into the air and the sunshine again; which can bid us be happy in spite of all philosophy, and _will_ be obeyed even by philosophers themselves,--who have long since found that they have no resource left against those enemies to their art, but to fly their presence, and shut themselves up in schools and studies.

The Swift, whose strange flight has for a moment led us astray from our course, is the only one of its tribe that has yet made any preparations towards departure: though the young broods of House-swallows and House-martins are evidently _thinking_ of it, and congregating together in great flocks, about the tops of old towers and belfries, to talk the matter over, and wonder with one another what will happen to them in their projected travels--if they _do_ travel. Their parents, however, who are to lead them, are still employed in increasing their company, and have just now brought out their second broods into the open air.

Now, on warm still evenings, we may sometimes see the whole air about us speckled with another class of emigrants, who are not usually regarded as such; namely, the flying Ants, whom their own offspring, or their inclinations (for it is uncertain which), have expelled from their birth-place, to found new colonies, and find new habitations, where they can. It is a ticklish task to make people more knowing than they wish to be, and one which, even if I were qualified for the office, I should be very shy of undertaking. But when a race of comparatively foolish and improvident little creatures have for ages enjoyed the credit of being proverbial patterns of wisdom, prudence, and forethought, I cannot refuse to assist in dispelling the delusion. Be it known, then, to the elderly namesakes of the above, that when they bid their little nephews and nieces "go to the Ant, and consider its ways," they can scarcely offer them advice less likely to end, if followed, in teaching them to "be wise:" for, in fact, one of those "ways" is, to sleep ("sluggards" as they are!) all the winter through; another is, never to lay up a single morsel of store even for a day, much less for a whole year, as has been reported of them; and a third is, to do what they are in fact doing at this very moment--namely, to come out in myriads from their homes, and fill the air with that food (themselves) which serves to fatten the _really_ wise, prudent, and industrious Swallows and Martins, who are skimming through the air delightedly in search of it. It is true, the Ants are active enough in providing for their immediate wants, and artful enough in overcoming any obstacles to their immediate pleasures. But all this, and more, the _other_ Aunts, who hold them up as patterns, will find their little pupils sufficiently expert in, without any assistance.

Now, we may observe that pretty pair of rural pictures (not, however, _peculiar_ to this month); first, when the numerous Flock is driven to fold, as the day declines,--its scattered members converging towards a point as they enter the narrow opening of their nightly enclosure, which they gradually fill and settle into, as a shallow stream runs into a bed that has been prepared for it, and there settles into a still pool.--And again, in the early morning, when the slender barrier that confines them is removed, they crowd and hurry out at it,--gently intercepting each other; and as they get free, pour forth their white fleeces over the open field, as a lake that has broken its bank pours its waters over the adjoining land: in each case, the bells and meek voices of the patient people making music as they move, and the Shepherd standing carelessly by (leaning on his crook, even as shepherds did in Arcady itself!) and leaving the care of all to his half-reasoning dog.

As I have again got my pencil in hand, instead of my pen, let me not forget to sketch a copy of that other pretty picture, at once so still and yet so lively, which may be had this month for the price of looking at, and than which Paul Potter himself could not have presented us with a sweeter: and indeed, but that he was a mere imitator of Nature, one might almost swear it to be his, not hers.--Fore-ground: on one side, a little shallow pond, with two or three pollard willows stooping over it; and on the other a low bank, before which stand as many more pollard willows, with round trim heads set formally on their straight pillar-like stems: between all these, the sunshine lying in bright streaks on the green ground, and made distinguishable by the straight shadows thrown by the thick stems of the trees. Middle distance: a moist meadow, level as a line, and on it half a dozen cattle; three lying at their ease, and "chewing the cud of sweet" (not "bitter") herbage--two cropping the same--and one lifting up its grave matronly face, and lowing out into the side distance; while, about the legs of all of them, a little flock of Wagtails are glancing in and out merrily, picking up their delicate meal of invisible insects; and upon the very back of one of the ruminators, a pert Magpie has perched himself. Of the extreme distance, half is occupied by dim-seen willows, of the same stunted growth with those in front; and the rest shows indistinctly, and half hidden by trees, a little village,--its church spire pointing its silent finger straight upward, as if bidding us look at a sky scarcely less calm and sweet than the scene which it canopies.--How says the connoisseur? Is this a picture of Paul Potter's, or of Nature? But no matter,--for they are almost the same. There is only just enough difference between them to make us feel (as the possessor of twin children does) that we are blessed with _two_ instead of _one_.

In the Plantation and Flower-garden we must hardly expect to find much of novelty, after the profusion of last month. And in fact there are very few flowers the first appearance of which can be said to be absolutely _peculiar_ to this month; most of those hitherto unnamed choosing to be the medium of a pleasant interchange between the two months, according as seasons, and circumstances of soil and planting, may dispose them. It must be admitted, however (though I am very loth, even by implication, to dissever this month from absolute summer), that many of the flowers which do come forward now are _autumn_ ones. Conspicuous among those which first appear in this month, is the stately Holyoak; a plant whose pretensions are not so generally admitted as they ought to be, probably on account of its having, by some strange accident, lost its character for _gentility_. Has this (in the present day) dire misfortune happened to it, because it condescends to flower in as much splendour and variety when leaning beside low cottage porches, or spiring over broken and lichen-grown palings, as it does in the gardens of the great? I hope not; for then those who contemn it must do the same by the vaunted Rose, and the rich Carnation; for where do _they_ blow better than in the daisy-bordered flower-beds of the poor? The only plausible plea which I can discover, for the reasonableness of banishing from our choice parterres this most magnificent of all their inhabitants, is, that its aspiring and oriental splendour may put to shame the less conspicuous beauties of Flora's court. I hope the latter have not, through envy, been entering into a conspiracy to fix an ill name upon the Holyoak, and thus stir up in the hearts of their admirers a dislike to it, that nothing else is so likely to produce: for, give even a flower "an ill name," and you may as well treat it like a dog at once. In fact, I do not think that any thing short of calling it _ungenteel_ could have displaced the Holyoak from that universal favour with us which it always acquires during our youth, in virtue of its being the only flower that we can distinguish in "garden scenes" on the stage.

As the Holyoak is at present a less _petted_ flower than any other, perhaps the Passion-flower (which blows this month) is, of all those which bear the open air, the most so; and, I must say, with quite as little reason. In fact, its virtue lies in its name; which it owes, however, to its fantastical construction suggesting certain religious associations, and not to any romantic or sentimental ones; which latter, when connected with it, have grown out of its name, and not its name out of them. If, however, it has little that is beautiful and flower-like about it, it has something bizarre and recherchée, which is well worth examining. But we examine it as we would a watch or a compass, and not a flower; which is its great fault. It is to other flowers, what a Blue-stocking is to other women.

Among the other flowers that appear now, the most conspicuous, and most beautiful, is that one of the Campanulas which shoots up from its cluster of low leaves one or more tall straight spires, clustered around from heel to point with brilliant sky-blue stars, crowding as closely to each other as those in the milky way,--till they look like one continuous rod of blue, or like the sky-blue ribbons on the mane of a Lord Mayor's coach-horse. These are the flowers that you see in pots, trained into a fan-like shape, till they cover, with their brilliant galaxy of stars, the whole window of the snug parlour where sits at her work the wife of the village apothecary. Of course I speak of a not less distance from town than a long day's journey: any nearer than that, all flowers but exotics have long since been banished from parlour windows, as highly ungenteel.

There are a few other very noticeable flowers, which begin to show themselves to us late in this month; but as they by rights rank among the autumn ones, and as I am not willing to admit that we have as yet arrived even on the confines of that season, I must consider that they have chosen to come before their time, and treat them accordingly.

In the Shrubbery, too, we shall find little of novelty. We will, therefore, at once pass through it, and reach the Orchard and Fruit Garden; merely observing as we go, that the Elder is beginning to cast a tinge of autumnal purple on its profuse berries; that those of the Rowan, or Mountain Ash, are on the point of putting on their scarlet liveries, which they are to wear all the winter; and that the Purple Clematis is heavy with its handsome flowers.

Perhaps the Fruit-Garden is never in a more favourable state for observation than at present; for most of its produce is sufficiently advanced to have put on all its beauty, while but little of it is in a state to disturb: so that there it hangs in the sight of its satisfied owner--at once a promise, and a fulfilment, without the attendant ills of either.

The inferior fruit, indeed (so at least it is reckoned with us, though in the East Indies a plate of Currants is sometimes placed in the centre of the table, as a Pine-apple is here, and holds exactly the same relative value in respect to the rest of the dessert), the Currants and Gooseberries are now in perfection, and those epicures from the nursery, who alone condescend to eat them in their natural state, may now be turned loose among them with impunity. A few of the Apples, too, are now asking to be plucked; namely, the pretty little, tender, and pale-faced Jeannotin (vulgaricè _Gennettin_); the rude-shaped, but firm, sweet, and rosy-cheeked Codling; and the cool, crisp, and refreshing Nonsuch,--eating, when at its best, like a glass of Apple-ice; and with a shape and make which entitles it to be called the very Apollo of Apples.

The Cherries, too, have most of them acquired their "cherry-cheeks," and are looking down temptation

"Unto the white upturned wond'ring eyes
Of _school-boys_, that fall back to gaze on them,"

as they hang over the garden-wall, next to the road.

As to the other fruits, they look almost as handsome and inviting as ever they will. But we must be content to let them "enjoy the air they breathe" for a month or so longer, if we expect them to do the same by us.

* * * * *

Of London what shall we say, at this only one of its seasons when it has nothing to say for itself? when even the most immoveable of its citizens become migratory for at least a month, and permit their wives and daughters to play the parts of mermaids on the shores of Margate, while they themselves pore over the evening papers all the morning, and over the morning ones all the evening?--when 'Change Alley makes a transfer of half its (live) stock every Saturday to the Steine at Brighton, to be returnable by Snow's coaches on Monday morning?--nay, when even the lawyers' clerks themselves begin to grow romantic, and, neglecting their accustomed evening haunts at the Cock in Fleet-street, Offley's, and the Cider Cellar, permit themselves to be steamed down from Billingsgate to Broadstairs, where they meditate moonlight sonnets to their absent Seraphinas (not without an eye to half-a-guinea each in the magazines), beginning with "Oh, come unto these yellow sands!"

What _can_ be said of the Town at a time like this? The truth is, I am not disposed to quarrel with London (any more than I am with my "bread and butter," and for a similar reason) at any season; so that the less I say or think of it now the better. Suffice it, that London in August is a species of nonentity, to all but those amateur architects who "go partnerships" in candle-lit grottos at the corners of courts. But, _en revanche_, it is to them a month that, like May to the chimney-sweepers, "only comes once a year."

SEPTEMBER.

I am sorry to mention it, but the truth must be told, even in a matter of age. The Year, then, is on the wane. It is "declining into the vale" of months. It has reached "a certain age." Its _bloom_ (that indescribable something which surpasses and supersedes all mere beauty) is fled, and with it all its pretensions to be regarded as an object of passionate admiration.

A truce, then, to our treatment of the Months as mistresses. But let us henceforth look upon them as the next best thing, as dear and devoted friends: for

"Turn wheresoe'er we may,
By night or day,
The things which we have seen we now can see no more."

'Tis true that still

"The Rainbow comes and goes,

* * *

The moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare;
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair;
The sunshine is a glorious birth;--
But yet we know, where'er we go,
That there hath passed away a glory from the Earth."

Let me be permitted to make use of a few more words from the same poem; for by no others can I hope so well to kindle in the reader, that feeling with which I would fain have him possessed, on the advent of this still delightful season of the year, if it be but received and enjoyed in the spirit in which it comes to us.

"What," then----

"What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from our sight--
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not--rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which, having been, must ever be;

* * * *

In the faith that looks through death;
In thoughts that bring the philosophic mind."

I cannot choose but continue this strain a little longer; and I suppose my readers will be the last persons to complain of my doing so; it is the poet alone who will have cause to object to his meanings throughout, and in one or two instances his words, being diverted from their original purpose, but I hope not degraded in their application, nor disenchanted of their power.

"And oh! ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Think not of any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might.

* * * *

The innocent brightness of a new-born day
Is lovely yet;
The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That watches o'er the Year's mortality.

* * * *

Thanks to the human heart by which we live;
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys and fears;
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."

Reader, this is said by the greatest poet of our age, and one of the deepest, wisest, and most virtuous of her philosophic sages. And it is said by him even in the sense in which it is here applied, _now that it has been once so applied_: for much of his words have this in common with those of Shakspeare, that you may turn them to an almost equally apt and good account in many different ways, besides those in which they were at first directed. Let them be received, then, in the spirit in which they are here uttered, and we shall be able and entitled to continue our task, of following the year through its vicissitudes, and still (as we began it) "pursue our course to the end, rejoicing."

The youth of the year is gone, then. Even the vigour and lustihood of its maturity are quick passing away. It has reached the summit of the hill, and is not only looking, but descending, into the valley below. But, unlike that into which the life of man declines, _this_ is not a vale of tears; still less does it, like that, lead to that inevitable bourne, the Kingdom of the Grave. For though it may be called (I hope without the semblance of profanation) "The Valley of the _Shadow_ of Death," yet of Death itself it knows nothing. No--the year steps onward towards its temporary decay, if not so rejoicingly, even more majestically and gracefully, than it does towards its revivification. And if September is not so bright with promise and so buoyant with hope as May, it is even more embued with that spirit of serene repose, in which the only true, because the only continuous enjoyment consists. Spring "never _is_, but always _to be_ blest;" but September is the month of consummations--the fulfiller of all promises--the fruition of all hopes--the era of all completeness. Let us then turn at once to gaze on, and partake in, its manifold beauties and blessings, not let them pass us by, with the empty salutation of mere praise; for the only panegyric that is acceptable to Nature is that just appreciation of her gifts which consists in the full enjoyment of them.

Supposing ourselves, as usual, in the middle of the month, we shall find the seed Harvests quite completed, and even the ground on which they stood appearing under an entirely new aspect,--the Plough having opened, or being now in the act of opening, its fragrant breast, and exposing it for a while to the genial influence of the sun and air, before it is again called upon to perform its never-failing functions.

There are other Harvests, however, which are still to be gathered in; in particular, that most elegant and picturesque of all with which this country is acquainted, and which may also be considered as _peculiar_ to this country, upon any thing like a great scale: I mean the Hop Harvest. In the few counties in which this plant is cultivated, we are now presented with the nearest semblance we can boast, of the Vintages of Italy and Spain.

The Apple Harvest, too, of the Cider counties takes place this month; and though I must not represent it as very fertile in the elegant and picturesque, let me not neglect to do justice to its produce, as the only one deserving the name of British Wine; all other so-called liquors being, the reader may rest assured, worse than poisons, in the exact proportion that specious hypocrites are worse than open, bold-faced villains.

I hope the good housewives of my country (the only country in the world which produces the breed) need not be told, that, in thus placarding the impostor above-named, I have not the slightest thought of hurting the high reputation of her immaculate "home-made," which she so generously brings out from the bottom division of her shining beaufet, and presses (somewhat importunately) on every morning comer. She shall never have to ask me twice to taste even a second glass of it, always provided she calls it by its true and trustworthy name of "home-made"--to which, in _my_ vocabulary, Montepulciano itself must yield the pas. But if, bitten perhaps by some London Bagman, she happen to have contracted an affection for fine phrases, and chooses to call her cordial by the style and title of "_British wine_"--away with it, for me! I would not touch it,

"Though 'twere a draught for Juno when she banquets."

In fact, she might as well call it _Cape_ at once!

The truth is, I once, to oblige an elderly lady at Hackney, _did_ taste two glasses of "British wine" at a sitting; and my stomach has had a load (of sugar of lead) upon its conscience ever since.

It must be confessed, that the general face of the country has undergone a very material change for the worse since we left it last month; and none of its individual features, with the exception of the Woods and Groves, have improved in their appearance. The Fields are for the most part bare, and either black and arid with the remains of the Harvest that has been gathered from them, or at best but newly furrowed by the plough. The ever green Meadows are indeed still beautiful, and the more so for the Cattle that now stud them almost every where; the second crops of grass being long since off. The Hedge-rows, too, have lost much of their sweet tapestry of flowers, and even their late many-tinted greens are sobered down into one dull monotonous hue. And the berries and other wild fruits that the latter part of the season produces, do not vary this hue,--having none of them as yet assumed the colours of their maturity. It is true the Woodbine again flings up, here and there, its bunches of pale flowers, after having ceased to do so for many weeks. But they have no longer the rich luxuriance of their Spring bloom, nor even the delicious scent which belonged to them when the vigour of youth was upon them. They are the pale and feeble offspring of the declining life of their parent.

It follows, from this general absence of wild flowers, that we are now no longer greeted, on our morning or evening wanderings, by those exquisite odours that float about upon the wings of every Summer wind, and come upon the captivated sense like strains of unseen music.

Even the Summer birds, both songsters and others, begin to leave us--urged thereto by a prophetic instinct, that will not be disobeyed: for if they were to consult their _feelings_ merely, there is no season at which the temperature of our climate is more delightfully adapted to their pleasures and their wants.

But let it not be supposed that we have nothing to compensate for all these losses. The Woods and Groves, those grandest and most striking among the general features of the country, are now, towards the end of the month, beginning to put on their richest looks. The Firs are gradually darkening towards their winter blackness; the Oaks, Limes, Poplars, and Horse-chestnuts, still retain their darkest summer green; the Elms and Beeches are changing to that bright yellow which produces, at a distance, the effect of patches of sunshine; and the Sycamores are beginning, here and there, to assume a brilliant warmth of hue almost amounting to scarlet. The distant effect, therefore, of a great company of all these seen together, and intermingled with each other, is finer than it has hitherto been, though not equal in beauty and variety to what it will be about the same time next month.

But we have some other pretty sights belonging to the open country, which must not be passed over; and one which the whole year, in point of time, and the whole world, in point of place, can scarcely parallel. The Sunsets of September in this country are perhaps unrivalled, for their infinite variety, and their indescribable beauty. Those of more southern countries may perhaps match, or even surpass them, for a certain glowing and unbroken intensity. But for gorgeous variety of form and colour, exquisite delicacy of tint and pencilling, and a certain placid sweetness and tenderness of general effect, which frequently arises out of a union of the two latter, there is nothing to be seen like what we can show in England at this season of the year. If a painter, who was capable of doing it to the utmost perfection, were to dare depict on canvas one out of twenty of the Sunsets that we frequently have during this month, he would be laughed at for his pains. And the reason is, that people judge of pictures by pictures. They compare Hobbima with Ruysdael, and Ruysdael with Wynants, and Wynants with Wouvermans, and Wouvermans with Potter, and Potter with Cuyp; and then they think the affair can proceed no farther. And the chances are, that if you were to show one of the sunsets in question to a thorough-paced connoisseur in this department of Fine Art, he would reply, that it was very beautiful, to be sure, but that he must beg to doubt whether it was _natural_, for he had never seen one like it in any of the old masters!

Another singular sight belonging to this period, is the occasional showers of gossamer that fall from the upper regions of the air, and cover every thing like a veil of woven silver. You may see them descending through the sunshine, and glittering and flickering in it, like rays of another kind of light. Or if you are in time to observe them before the Sun has dried the dew from off them in the early morning, they look like robes of fairy tissue-work, gemmed with innumerable jewels.

Now, too, Thistle-down, and the beautiful winged seeds of the Dandelion, float along through the calm air upon their voyages of discovery, as if instinct with life.

Now, among the Birds, we have something like a renewal of the Spring melodies. In particular, the Thrush and Blackbird, who have been silent for several weeks, recommence their songs,--bidding good bye to the Summer, in the same subdued tone in which they hailed her approach.

Finally, in connexion with the open country, now Wood-owls hoot louder than ever; and the Lambs bleat shrilly from the hill-side to their neglectful dams; and the thresher's Flail is heard from the unseen barn; and the plough-boy's whistle comes through the silent air from the distant upland; and Snakes leave their last year's skins in the brakes--literally creeping out at their own mouths; and Acorns drop in showers from the oaks, at every wind that blows; and Hazel-nuts ask to be plucked, so invitingly do they look forth from their green dwellings; and, lastly, the evenings close in too quickly upon the walks to which their serene beauty invites us, and the mornings get chilly, misty, and damp.

Thanks to the art of the cultivator, we shall find the Garden almost as gay with flowers as it was last month; for many of those of last month still remain; and a few, and those among the most gorgeous that blow, have only just opened. The chief of these latter is the China-aster; the superb _Reine Marguerite_, whose endless variety of stars shoot up in rich clusters, and glow like so many lighted catherine-wheels. The great climbing Convolvulus also hangs out its beautiful cups among its smooth and clustering leaves; and the rich aromatic Scabious lifts up its glowing purple flowers on their lithe stems; and the profuse Dahlia, that beautiful novelty, which was till so lately almost unknown to us, scatters about its rich double and single blooms, some of them so intense in colour that they seem to _glow_ as you look upon them. And lastly, now the pendulous Amaranth hangs its gentle head despondingly, and tells its tender tale almost as pathetically as the poem to which it gives a name[3].

[3] "O'Connor's Child; or the Flower of Love lies Bleeding."

Among the flowering Shrubs, too, we have now some of the most beautiful at their best. In particular, the Althea Frutex, and the Arbutus, or Strawberry-tree.

As for the Fruit Garden, _that_ is one scene of tempting profusion. Against the wall, the Grapes have put on that transparent look which indicates their complete ripeness, and have dressed their cheeks in that delicate bloom which enables them to bear away the bell of beauty from all their rivals.--The Peaches and Nectarines have become fragrant, and the whole wall where they hang is "musical with bees."--Along the Espaliers, the rosy-cheeked Apples look out from among their leaves, like laughing children peeping at each other through screens of foliage; and the young standards bend their straggling boughs to the earth with the weight of their produce.

* * * * *

Quitting the Country, we shall find London but ill qualified to compensate us for the losses we have sustained there; and if there be any reason in betaking oneself to places at the seaside, that are neither London nor the Country, now is the time to do it--as the citizens of London, and the liberties thereof, know full well. Accordingly, now the mansions in Finsbury and Devonshire Squares on the East, and Queen and Russell on the West, are changed for mouse-traps (miscalled marine villas); and the tradesman who does not send his wife and family to wash themselves in sea-water cannot be doing well in the world. Now, therefore, the Brighton boarding-houses bask in the sunshine of city favour, always provided their drawing-rooms look upon the sea; and if you pass them on a warm afternoon about five o'clock, you may see their dining-room windows wide open, and their inmates acting a picturesque passage in one of Mr. Wordsworth's pastorals:

"There are forty feeding like one."

But if the citizens (because they cannot help it) permit their wives and daughters to be in their glory, _out_ of London at this period, they permit their apprentices, for the same reason, to be so _in_ it: for now arrives that Saturnalia of nondescript noise and nonconformity, Bartlemy Fair;--when that Prince of peace-officers, the Lord Mayor, changes his sword of state into a sixpenny trumpet, and becomes the Lord of Misrule and the patron of pickpockets; and Lady Holland's name leads an unlettered mob instead of a lettered one; when Mr. Richardson maintains, during three whole days and a half, a managerial supremacy that must be not a little enviable even in the eyes of Mr. Elliston himself; and Mr. Gyngell holds, during the same period, a scarcely less distinguished station as the Apollo of servant-maids; when "the incomparable (not to say _eternal_) _young_ Master Saunders" rides on horseback to the admiration of all beholders, in the person of his eldest son; and when all the giants in the land, and the dwarfs too, make a general muster, and each proves to be, according to the most correct measurement, at least a foot taller or shorter than any other in the fair, and, in fact, the only one worth seeing,--"all the rest being impostors!" In short, when every booth in the fair combines in itself the attractions of all the rest, and so perplexes with its irresistible merit the rapt imagination of the half-holiday schoolboys who have got but sixpence to spend upon the whole, that they eye the outsides of each in a state of pleasing despair, till their leave of absence is expired twice over, and then return home filled with visions of giants and gingerbread-nuts, and dream all night long of what they have _not_ seen.

_Au reste_, London must needs be but a sorry place in September, when even its substantial shopkeepers are ashamed to be seen in it, and when a careful porter may, if he pleases, carry a load on his head from Saint Paul's to the Mansion House, without damaging the heads of more than half a dozen pedestrians.

As for the West End at this period, it looks like a model of itself, seen through a magnifying glass--every thing is so sad, silent, and empty of life. The vacant windows look blank at each other across the way; the doors and their knockers are no more at variance; the porters sleep away the heavy hours in their easy chairs, leaving the rings to be answered from the area; and if you want to cross the street, you look both ways first, for fear of being run over--thinking, from the absolute stillness, that the stones of the pavement have been put to silence by the art-magic of Mr. Macadam.

But notwithstanding all this, the Winter Theatres, having permitted their Summer rivals to play to empty benches for nearly three months, now put in their claim to share this pleasing privilege, lest it should be supposed that they too cannot afford to lose a hundred pounds a night as well as their inferiors. Accordingly, every body can have orders now (except those who ask for them); and the pit is the only place for those who are above sitting on the same bench with their boot-maker.

Let us not forget to add, that there is _one_ part of London which is never out of season, and is never more _in_ season than now. Covent Garden Market is still the Garden of Gardens; and as there is not a month in all the year in which it does not contrive to belie something or other that has been said in the foregoing pages, as to the particular season of certain flowers, fruits, &c. so now it offers the flowers and the fruits of every season united. How it becomes possessed of all these, I shall not pretend to say: but thus much I am bound to add by way of information,--that those ladies and gentlemen who have country houses in the neighbourhood of Clapham Common or Camberwell Grove, may now have the pleasure of eating the best fruit out of their own Gardens--provided they choose to pay the price of it in Covent Garden Market!

OCTOBER.

They tell us, in regard to this voyage of ours, called Human Life, that

"Hope travels through, nor leaves us till we die."

But they might have gone still farther, and shown us that Hope is not only our companion on the journey, but at once the vehicle which bears us along, the food which supports us as we go, and the goal to which all our travels tend, not merely in the great voyage of discovery itself, but in all the little outlets and byeways which break in upon and diversify it.

Even in regard to the objects of external nature, Hope is the great principle on which we take any thing like a continuous moral interest in the contemplation of them; and if we never cease to feel that interest during all the different periods of the year, it is because hope is no sooner lost in fruition, than, like the Phoenix, it revives again, and keeps fluttering on before us, like the beautiful Green Bird before the lover, in the fairy tale; leading us--no matter where, so that it do not leave us to plod on by ourselves, through a world that, however beautiful _with_ it, were without it an overpeopled wilderness.

The month that we have just left behind us was indeed one made up, for the most part, of consummations; the promises of the year being almost forgotten in the fulness of their performance, and the season standing still to enjoy itself, and to let its admirers satiate themselves upon the rich completeness of its charms. It is now gone; and October is come; and Hope is come with it; and the general impulse that we feel is, to _look forward_ again, as we have done from the beginning of the year.

It must be confessed, however, that the hopes of _this_ month, in particular, are not unblended with that sentiment of melancholy--gentle and genial, but still melancholy--which results from the constant presence of decay. The year has reached its grand climacteric, and is fast falling "into the sere, the yellow leaf." Every day a flower drops from out the wreath that binds its brow--not to be renewed. Every hour the Sun looks more and more askance upon it, and the winds, those Summer flatterers, come to it less fawningly. Every breath shakes down showers of its leafy attire, leaving it gradually barer and barer, for the blasts of winter to blow through it. Every morning and evening takes away from it a portion of that light which gives beauty to its life, and chills it more and more into that torpor which at length constitutes its temporary death. And yet October is beautiful still, no less "for what it gives than what it takes away;" and even for what it gives during the very act of taking away.

Let us begin our observations with an example of the latter. The whole year cannot produce a sight fraught with more rich and harmonious beauty than that which the Woods and Groves present during this month, notwithstanding, or rather in consequence of, the daily decay of their summer attire; and at no other season can any given spot of landscape be seen to much advantage as a mere picture. This, therefore, is, above all others, the month for the artist to ply his delightful task, of fixing the fugitive beauties of the scene; which, however, he must do quickly, for they fade away, day by day, as he looks upon them.

And yet, if it were represented faithfully, an extensive plantation of Forest Trees now presents a variety of colours and of tints that would scarcely be considered as _natural_ in a picture, any more than many of the Sunsets of September would. Among those trees which retain their green hues, the Fir tribe are the principal; and these, spiring up among the deciduous ones, now differ from them no less in colour than they do in form. The Alders, too, and the Poplars, Limes, and Horse-chestnuts, are still green,--the hues of their leaves not undergoing much change as long as they remain on the branches. Most of the other Forest Trees have put on each its peculiar livery; the Planes and Sycamores presenting every variety of tinge, from bright yellow to brilliant red; the Elms being, for the most part, of a rich sunny umber, varying according to the age of the tree and the circumstances of its soil, &c.; the Beeches having deepened into a warm glowing brown, which the young ones will retain all the winter, and till the new spring leaves push the present ones off; the Oaks varying from a dull dusky green to a deep russet, according to their ages; and the Spanish Chestnuts, with their noble embowering heads, glowing like clouds of gold.

As for the Hedge-rows this month, they still retain all their effect as part of a general and distant view; and when looked at more closely, though they have lost nearly all their flowers, the various fruits that are spread out upon them for the winter food of the birds, make them little less gay than they were in Spring and Summer. The most conspicuous of these are the red hips of the Wild Rose; the dark purple bunches of the luxuriant Blackberry; the brilliant scarlet and green berries of the Nightshade; the wintry-looking fruit of the Hawthorn; the blue Sloes, covered with their soft tempting-looking bloom; the dull bunches of the Woodbine; and the sparkling Holly-berries.

We may also still, by seeking for them, find a few flowers scattered about beneath the Hedge-rows, and the dry Banks that skirt the Woods, and even in the Woods themselves, peeping up meekly from among the crowds of newly fallen leaves. The prettiest of these is the Primrose, which now blows a second time. But two or three of the Persicaria tribe are still in flower, and also some of the Goosefoots. And even the elegant and fragile Heathbell, or Harebell, has not yet quite disappeared; while some of the ground flowers that have passed away have left in their place strange evidences of their late presence; in particular, the singular flower (if it can be called one) of the Arums, or Lords and Ladies, has changed into an upright bunch, or long cluster, of red berries, starting up from out the ground on a single stiff stem, and looking almost like the flower of a Hyacinth.