There’s a path beside the river,
Winding through the willow copse
Where I love to walk in autumn
Ere the season’s curtain drops.
On far hillsides beech and maple,
Touched by early nipping frost,
Have their brown and crimson jackets
To the boisterous breezes tossed.
Still the willow leaves are clinging,
Latest foliage of fall,
Shading yet my river pathway
Underneath the osiers tall.
On the wimpling water’s surface
Drift a million truant leaves,
Stolen from the woodland reaches
By the wind, the prince of thieves.
All along the river edges
Verdure’s turned to brown and gray,
Rustling through the dying sedges
Autumn’s low voiced breezes play.
Nowhere sweeter walk or rarer
Than my path beside the stream.
There I love to stroll in autumn,
There to loiter and to dream.
—Frank Farrington.
[Illustration: EGG PLANT FRUIT.
(Solanum esculentum).]
EGG PLANT.
(_Solanum esculentum_ L.)
The Egg-plant, also known as bringal, aubergine, egg-apple and
mad-apple, is an herbaceous plant belonging to the Nightshade family
(Solananæ), therefore kin to the potato and tomato. It is a tender
annual, readily killed by the early frosts. It has rather large, simple,
somewhat incised leaves. The fruits are large, egg-shaped, tomato-like
in structure, hence berries.
It is quite extensively cultivated in gardens. The seeds are sown in hot
beds early in April but transplanting is not done until about the first
of June, when all danger of frost is past. The soil should be very rich
and the plants set about three feet apart. Like most transplanted plants
they require shading and watering for a few days. Careful cultivation is
required during the entire season. Propping may be necessary to keep the
large, heavy fruits from the ground. The Colorado beetle is a very
annoying enemy of the growing plants and must be effectually fought to
insure a crop.
There are several varieties of Egg-plant. The purple variety is by long
odds the greatest favorite. There are also white and yellow varieties.
Most people consider the properly prepared fruit of the Egg-plant a
delicacy. In some tropical countries it forms an important article of
diet. The ripe fruit is prepared for the table by peeling and boiling.
After boiling the fruit is sliced, seasoned and fried until well
browned, in rolled crackers or bread crusts and a liberal supply of
butter. When well prepared it is a very palatable article of diet but
when insufficiently cooked or fried it is indigestible. It does not seem
to be prepared in other ways nor does it seem to have any noteworthy
medicinal properties.
Albert Schneider.
There comes, from yonder height,
A soft repining sound,
Where forest leaves are bright,
And fall, like flakes of light,
To the ground.
It is the autumn breeze,
That, lightly floating on,
Just skims the weedy leas,
Just stirs the glowing trees,
And is gone.
—William Cullen Bryant, “The Voice of Autumn.”