standing a gloomy advance guard of the shadows of the night. At its foot
the newer green of the late spring foliage took a frivolous aspect,
presenting the effect of deep-tinted foam breaking against the
impenetrable mass of darkness.

The boy trudged resolutely along the sandy road, reaching at intervals
to grasp handfuls of sassafras leaves from the bushes beside the way.
From the ditch on the left a brown toad hopped slowly into the dust of
the road. On the worm-eaten rails of the fence, on the other side, a
gray lizard glided swiftly like a stealthy shadow of the leaves of the
poisonous oak.

Nicholas picked up a stone from the roadside and aimed it at the slimy
little body, but his throw erred, and the missile fell harmlessly into
the wheat field beyond, startling a blackbird with scarlet marks, which
soared suddenly above the bearded grain and vanished, with a tremulous
cry and a flame of outstretched wings, into the distant wood.

The sun had gone down behind the pines and a warm mist steamed up from
the cooling earth, condensing into heavy dew on the dusty leaves of the
plants in the ditch. Above the lowering pines the horizon burned to a
deep scarlet, like an inverted brazier at red heat, and one gigantic
tree, rising beyond the jagged line of the forest, was silhouetted
sharply against the enkindled clouds. Suddenly, from the shadows of the
long road, a voice rose plaintively. It was rich and deep and
colourific, and it seemed to hover close to the warmth of the earth,
weighed down by its animal melody. It had mingled so subtly with the
stillness that it was as much a part of nature as the cry of a
whip-poor-will beyond the thicket or the sunset in the pine-guarded
west. At first it came faintly, and the words were lost, but as Nicholas