these autumnal tints than in summer. Then they looked blue, misty, and
dim. Now they show their great humpbacks more plainly, as if they had
drawn nearer to us.

A waste of shrubbery and small trees, such as overruns the borders of the
meadows for miles together, looks much more rugged, wild, and savage in
its present brown color than when clad in green.

I passed through a very pleasant wood-path yesterday, quite shut in and
sheltered by trees that had not thrown off their yellow robes. The sun
shone strongly in among them, and quite kindled them; so that the path
was brighter for their shade than if it had been quite exposed to the
sun.

In the village graveyard, which lies contiguous to the street, I saw a
man digging a grave, and one inhabitant after another turned aside from
his way to look into the grave and talk with the digger. I heard him
laugh, with the traditionary mirthfulness of men of that occupation.

In the hollow of the woods, yesterday afternoon, I lay a long while
watching a squirrel, who was capering about among the trees over my head
(oaks and white-pines, so close together that their branches
intermingled). The squirrel seemed not to approve of my presence,
for he frequently uttered a sharp, quick, angry noise, like that of a
scissors-grinder's wheel. Sometimes I could see him sitting on an
impending bough, with his tail over his hack, looking down pryingly upon
me. It seems to be a natural posture with him, to sit on his hind legs,
holding up his fore paws. Anon, with a peculiarly quick start, he would
scramble along the branch, and be lost to sight in another part of the
tree, whence his shrill chatter would again be heard. Then I would see