sional tiny goldenrod, still true to its name when most had proved disloyal; the silvery masses of everlasting; the old mullen stalks, the steeple chase, still retaining the form but not the beauty of life; the scattered leaves, riding bare-back down the wind to join their companions below in their last part in Autumn's carnival-all these gave consistent testimony that the witness of wind and crickets was true. So we insisted upon no further evidence, but took our station upon a large vein of quartz, seaming the granite cliff, it

the steady chug, chug, of motor boats. grew near and passed, threading and crossing their thousand ways; when the sound of distant music stole across the moonlit water; when the little fleet of steamers plied their busy routes; and the cottages which line the shore were, like their occupants, clothed in summer attire. Ah, yes! Well might the enthusiast of summer, the transient guest, exclaim-Sunapee, the Beautiful!" But now, how changed! Will the test of such change be met?

The summer season's over. Scat

tered far and wide the eager, happy throng of faces-returned to college chair, and pulpit; to office and work bench; to school and home; taking with them health, and strength, and memories that make life rich. Not a thread of smoke arises from even one of the many chimneys that show on yonder shore. Only back of the Ben Mere, at the head of the harbor, is there evidence that a town is near; and even the Ben Mere is closed. Not a launch, or sail, or craft of any kind is to be seen. Yonder, where the fish

other along the surface in playful imitation of the earlier regatta races. Out on the main body of the lake, here and there, a white cap shows for a moment and then disappears. In the near a lighthouse perches picturesquely upon a mass of half hidden rocks, over some of which the low waters whiten as they play. Half way down the lake from us the water is intersected to the view by a promontory and Great Island, but shows beyond in calmer, because more distant, aspect. Along the lower end, a

ing buoys bobbed with the passing waves, where patient fishermen matched their powers against the finned beauties, a hundred feet below, now the wild ducks chum, or rise in startled flight. One straggler of the summer saunters near, pauses to snap his camera, and remark on the beauty of the scene.

Desolate? Ah, no! The semi-solitude but lends aid to Nature's attempt at the beautiful; for beauty takes time, and loves solitude. Beneath spreads the blue water, never more so. Swept on by the north wind a dozen scuds of tiny waves race each

line of smoke from a passing train threads its way, and one hears the faint sound of the whistle as it battles its way up the reaches of the wind. To the right across the harbor a path of trembling light, too brilliant for the eye, at the center most dazzling, then shaking itself out on either side into more and more scattered sparkles of changing light, points to the setting sun, increasing as it nears the West, and grows more golden with approaching sunset. Beneath the densely wooded shore, in strong contrast already, the dusk of evening shadows is suggested in midafternoon.

The foliage! To that magic word what sure response! At the foot of the ledge the sumacs flame, as enacting anew the miracle of Horeb's desert. The ferns now matted into a carpet of russet brown. Maples, early touched, almost in winter garb almost, for here and there a single leaf or cluster still clings to outmost branch. Sturdy oaks refusing to surrender. The birch now is Autumn's king-and queen? Who but the birch in modest attire, setting off so gracefully whitened stem and branches? In the pasture land below are some apple trees, showing through thick foliage the rosy cheek of apple; the stately somberness of evergreens promiscuously scattered, and especially in the rear where that row of spruces present their jagged tops against the sky. Across the harbor neck Hedgehog, despite its name, climbs upward in beauty's array, fit candidate for Nature's masterpiece. Far to the south Mt. Sunapee looms large upon

the horizon, clothed in colors less distinct, dark-mottled in its depressions and draped on its eastern slope with lengthening shadows. Toward the sunset is Ascutney, and, directly opposite, Kearsarge smiling in the sunlight as it bids its friends good-night.

One further touch-the clouds! Mostly to the northeast they lie, just above the horizon in cold steel gray, capped with an irregular line of white well up the sky, as though a mighty range of mountains reared itself there, crowned with eternal snow. Above scattered cloud thins into haze, itself soon to disappear in the unspecked blue of infinite sky.

Verily, even more true in autumn than in summer, the native poet's tribute

"Lake of the wild-fowl, Soo-Nipi the Blest! Agleam in gold of summer day begun, Rosed with the crimson ray of stooping

sun,

Jeweled by pallid planet in the West-
Oh thou art beautiful, whate'er the test!''

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