increasing distinctness.

The watcher turned from the White City across the Potomac and slowly
walked into his rose garden. Even in September the riot of color was
beyond description. In the splendor of the full Southern moon could be
seen all shades from deep blood red to pale pink. All sizes from the
tiniest four-leaf wild flowers to the gorgeous white and yellow masses
that reared their forms like waves of the surf. He breathed the perfume
and smiled again. A mocking bird, dropping from the bough of a holly,
was singing the glory of a second blooming.

The scene of entrancing beauty drove the thought of strife from his
heart. He turned back toward the house and its joys of youth.

Sam's sonorous voice was ringing in deliberation the grand call of the
evening's festivities:

"Choose-yo-pardners-fer-de-ol-Virginy-Reel!"

And then the stir, the rush, the commotion for place in the final dance.
The reel reaches the whole length of the hall with every foot of space
crowded. There are thirty couples in line when the musicians pause, tune
their instruments and with a sudden burst play "The Gray Eagle." The
Virginia Reel stirs the blood of these Southern boys and girls. Its
swift, graceful action and the inspiration of the old music seem part of
the heart beat of the youth and beauty that sway to its cadences.

The master of Arlington smiled at the memory of the young Congressman's
eloquence. Surely it was only a flight of rhetoric.