then collapse suddenly, roll over, and turn their bellies in the air.

Every growing thing has received its peculiar impress: the delicately
blown breath of the first cold. The stubbles straggle wanly sunwards, and
the falling leaves rustle to the earth, with a sound as of errant
silkworms.

It is the reign of Autumn, the height of the Carnival of Decay, the roses
have got inflammation in their blushes, an uncanny hectic tinge, through
their soft damask.

I felt myself like a creeping thing on the verge of destruction, gripped
by ruin in the midst of a whole world ready for lethargic sleep. I rose,
oppressed by weird terrors, and took some furious strides down the path.
"No!" I cried out, clutching both my hands; "there must be an end to
this," and I reseated myself, grasped the pencil, and set seriously to
work at an article.

There was no possible use in giving way, with the unpaid rent staring me
straight in the face.

Slowly, quite slowly, my thoughts collected. I paid attention to them, and
wrote quietly and well; wrote a couple of pages as an introduction. It
would serve as a beginning to anything. A description of travel, a
political leader, just as I thought fit--it was a perfectly splendid
commencement for something or anything. So I took to seeking for some
particular subject to handle, a person or a thing, that I might grapple
with, and I could find nothing. Along with this fruitless exertion,
disorder began to hold its sway again in my thoughts. I felt how my brain
positively snapped and my head emptied, until it sat at last, light,