Page:Early Spring in Massachusetts (1881).djvu/277

Rh and stuffed with earth The earth lies out now like a leopard drying her lichen and moss spotted skin in the sun, her sleek and variegated hide. I know that the few raw spots will heal over. Brown is the color for me, the color of our coats and our daily lives, the color of the poor man's loaf. The bright tints are pies and cakes, good only for October feasts, which would make us sick if eaten every day Undoubtedly the geese fly more numerously over rivers which, like ours, flow north-easterly, are more at home with the water under them. Each flock runs the gauntlet of a thousand gunners; and when you see them steer off from you and your boat, you may remember how great their experience in such matters may be, how many such boats and gunners they have seen and avoided between here and Mexico. Even now (though you, low plodding, little dream it) they may perhaps see one or two more lying in wait ahead. They have an experienced ranger of the air for their guide. The echo of one gun hardly dies away, before they see another pointed at them. How many bullets or smaller shot have sped in vain toward their ranks!

Ducks fly more irregularly, and shorter distances at a time. The geese rest in fair weather by day only in the midst of our broadest