Читать книгу The Child's Favorite - a gift for the young - Anonymous - Страница 7

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"At length it comes, among the forest oaks,

With sobbing ebbs, and uproar gathering high.

The scared hoarse raven in his cradle croaks,

And slack dove flutters in its terrors by,

While the blue hawk hangs o'er them in the sky.

The hedger hastens from the storm begun,

To seek a shelter that may keep him dry,

And foresters low bent the wind to shun;

Scarce heard amid the strife the poacher's muttering gun."

Winter is coming! Boreas with his loud horn blows the leaves from the trees. Men and boys, wrap your cloaks or coats close around you. Now come gathering glooms and fogs. Now come cold rains, as if the earth required the cold water cure; the trees are dripping, the eaves are pouring, and the torn ragged-skirted clouds, seemingly dragged downwards, slantwise, by the threads of dusky rain that descend from them, are all mingled together in one blind confusion; while the few cattle that are left in the open pastures, forgetful of their feeding, turn their backs upon the besieging storm, and hanging down their heads till their noses touch the ground, stand out in the middle of the fields motionless, like images.

Now the felling of wood for the winter store—the measured strokes of the woodman's axe, heard far away in the thick forest, bring with their sound an associated feeling similar to that produced by a wreath of smoke rising from out the same scene. The busy flail, too, which is now in full employment, fills the air about the homestead with a pleasant sound, and invites little girls and boys to look in at the open doors of the barn, and see the wheat-stack reaching to the roof, on either hand, the little pyramid of bright grain behind the threshers, the scattered ears between them, leaping and rustling from their fast falling strokes, and the flail itself flying harmless round the labourer's head, though seeming to threaten danger at every turn; while outside, the flock of barn-door poultry ply their ceaseless search for food among the knee-deep straw; and the cattle, all their summer frolics forgotten, stand ruminating beside the half empty hay-rick, or lean with inquiring faces over the gate that looks down the village, or away towards the distant pastures.

Of the birds that have hitherto made merry, even at the approach of winter, now all are silent—all, save that one who now barns the title of the household bird, by haunting the thresholds and window-sills, and casting sidelong glances within doors, as if to reconnoitre the positions of all within, before the pinching frosts force him to lay aside his fears, and flit in and out silently, like a winged spirit—all are now silent except him; but he, as he sits on the pointed palings beside the doorway, or on the top-most twig of the apple tree, that has been left growing in the otherwise closely-clipped hedge, pipes plaintive ditties, with a low inward voice; while here and there a stray grasshopper is found chirping to the creaking boughs.

Now the farmer finishes all his out of door work, before the frosts set in, and lays by his implements till the awakening of spring calls him to his hard labour again.

Now the sheep, all their other more natural food failing, begin to be penned on patches of the turnip field, where they first devour the green tops joyfully, and then gradually hollow out the juicy root, holding it firm with their feet till nothing is left but the dry brown husk.

Now the herds stand all day long hanging their disconsolate heads beside the leafless hedges, and waiting as anxiously, though patiently, to be called home to the hay-fed stall, as they do in summer to be driven to the field.

Now the rain-storm breaks up all the pathways, and makes home no longer home to those who are not obliged to leave it, while it becomes doubly endeared to those that are.