“October!” you cry, “when all is changing and dying! when trees shed their leaves, when creepers crimson1, when summer singers desert our woods, when flowers grow scanty2 in field or hedgerow! What promise then of spring? What glad signs of a beginning?”
Even so things look at a superficial glance. Autumn, you would think, is the season of decay, of death, of dissolution, the end of all things, without hope or symbol of rejuvenescence. Yet look a little closer as you walk along the lanes, between the golden bracken, more glorious as it fades, and you will soon see that the cycle of the year’s life begins much more truly in October than at any other date in the shifting twelvemonth you can easily fix for it. Then the round of one year’s history draws to a beautiful close, while the round of another’s is well on the way to its newest avatar.
Gaze hard at the alders4 by the side of this little brook5 in the valley, for example, or at the silvery-barked birches here on the wind-swept moorland. They have dropped their shivering leaves, all wan6 yellow on the ground, and the naked twigs7 now stand silhouetted8 delicately in Nature’s etching against the pale grey-blue background. But what are those dainty little pendulous9 cylinders10, brown and beaded with the mist, that hang in tiny clusters half-unnoticed on the branches? Those? Why, can’t you guess? They are next April’s catkins. Pick them off, and open one, and you will find inside it the wee yellowish-green stamens, already distinctly formed, and rich with the raw material of future golden pollen11. The birch and the alder3 toiled12, like La Fontaine’s ant, through all the sunny summer, and laid by in their tissues the living stuff from which to produce next spring’s fluffy13 catkins. But that they may lose no time when April comes round again, and may take advantage of the first sunshiny day with a fine breeze blowing for the dispersal of their pollen, they just form the hanging masses of tiny flowers beforehand, in the previous autumn, keep them waiting in stock, so to speak, through the depth of winter, and unfold them at once with the earliest hint of genial14 April weather. Observe, though, how tightly the flowerets are wrapped in the close-fitting scales, overlapping15 like Italian tiles, to protect their tender tissues from the frost and snow; and how cleverly they are rolled up in their snug16 small cradles. As soon as spring breathes warm on them, however, the close valves will unfold, the short stamens will lengthen17 into hanging tassels18, and the pollen will shake itself free on the friendly breezes, to be wafted19 on their wings to the sensitive surface of the female flowers.
Look, again, at the knobs which line the wand-like stems and boughs20 of the willows21. Do you know what they are? Buds, you say. Yes, leaves for next spring, ready-made in advance, and curled up in embryo22, awaiting the summer. If you unfold them carefully with a needle and pocket-lens, you will find each miniature leaf is fully23 formed beforehand: the spring has even now begun by anticipation24; it only waits for the sun to unfold and realize itself. Or see, once more, the big sticky buds on the twigs of the horse-chestnut, how tightly and well they protect the new leaves; and notice at the same time the quaint25 horseshoe scar, with marks as of nails, left where the old leaves have just now fallen off, the nails being, in point of fact, the relics26 of the vascular27 bundles. Death, says the old proverb, is the gate of life. “Le roi est mort; vive le roi!” No sooner is one summer fairly over than another summer begins to be, under the eyes of the observer.
To those among us who shrink with dread28 from the Stygian gloom of English winter, there is something most consoling in this cheerful idea of Prophetic Autumn—this sense that winter is but a temporary sleep, during which the life already formed and well on its way to flower and foliage29 just holds its breath awhile in expectation of warmer weather. Nay30, more, the fresh young life of the new year has even begun in part to show itself already. Autumn, not spring, is the real season of seedlings31. Cast your eyes on the bank by the roadside yonder, and what do you see? The ground is green with tiny baby plants of prickly cleavers32 and ivy-leaved veronica. The seeds fall from the mother-plant on the soil in August, sprout33 and germinate34 with the September rains, and have formed a thick carpet of spring-like verdure by the middle of October. That is the common way with most of our wild annuals. Unlike so many pampered35 garden flowers, but like “fall” wheat in cold climates, they sow themselves in autumn, come up boldly at once, straggle somehow through the winter, of course with enormous losses, and are ready by spring to welcome the first rays of returning sunshine.
Even the animals in like manner are busy with their domestic preparations for next summer. The foundress wasps36, already fertilized37 by the autumn brood of drones, are retiring with their internal store of eggs to warm winter quarters, ready to lay and rear them in the earliest May weather. The dormouse is on the look-out for a snug hiding-place in the hazels. The caterpillars38 are spinning cocoons39 or encasing themselves in iridescent40 chrysalis shells, from which to emerge in April as full-fledged moths41 or gay cabbage butterflies. Everything is preparing for next summer’s idyll. Winter is but a sleep, if even that; thank Heaven, I see in autumn the “promise and potency” of all that makes June sweet or April vocal42.
点击收听单词发音
1 crimson | |
n./adj.深(绯)红色(的);vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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2 scanty | |
adj.缺乏的,仅有的,节省的,狭小的,不够的 | |
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3 alder | |
n.赤杨树 | |
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4 alders | |
n.桤木( alder的名词复数 ) | |
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5 brook | |
n.小河,溪;v.忍受,容让 | |
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6 wan | |
(wide area network)广域网 | |
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7 twigs | |
细枝,嫩枝( twig的名词复数 ) | |
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8 silhouetted | |
显出轮廓的,显示影像的 | |
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9 pendulous | |
adj.下垂的;摆动的 | |
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10 cylinders | |
n.圆筒( cylinder的名词复数 );圆柱;汽缸;(尤指用作容器的)圆筒状物 | |
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11 pollen | |
n.[植]花粉 | |
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12 toiled | |
长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的过去式和过去分词 ); 艰难缓慢地移动,跋涉 | |
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13 fluffy | |
adj.有绒毛的,空洞的 | |
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14 genial | |
adj.亲切的,和蔼的,愉快的,脾气好的 | |
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15 overlapping | |
adj./n.交迭(的) | |
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16 snug | |
adj.温暖舒适的,合身的,安全的;v.使整洁干净,舒适地依靠,紧贴;n.(英)酒吧里的私房 | |
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17 lengthen | |
vt.使伸长,延长 | |
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18 tassels | |
n.穗( tassel的名词复数 );流苏状物;(植物的)穗;玉蜀黍的穗状雄花v.抽穗, (玉米)长穗须( tassel的第三人称单数 );使抽穗, (为了使作物茁壮生长)摘去穗状雄花;用流苏装饰 | |
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19 wafted | |
v.吹送,飘送,(使)浮动( waft的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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20 boughs | |
大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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21 willows | |
n.柳树( willow的名词复数 );柳木 | |
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22 embryo | |
n.胚胎,萌芽的事物 | |
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23 fully | |
adv.完全地,全部地,彻底地;充分地 | |
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24 anticipation | |
n.预期,预料,期望 | |
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25 quaint | |
adj.古雅的,离奇有趣的,奇怪的 | |
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26 relics | |
[pl.]n.遗物,遗迹,遗产;遗体,尸骸 | |
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27 vascular | |
adj.血管的,脉管的 | |
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28 dread | |
vt.担忧,忧虑;惧怕,不敢;n.担忧,畏惧 | |
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29 foliage | |
n.叶子,树叶,簇叶 | |
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30 nay | |
adv.不;n.反对票,投反对票者 | |
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31 seedlings | |
n.刚出芽的幼苗( seedling的名词复数 ) | |
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32 cleavers | |
n.猪殃殃(其茎、实均有钩刺);砍肉刀,剁肉刀( cleaver的名词复数 ) | |
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33 sprout | |
n.芽,萌芽;vt.使发芽,摘去芽;vi.长芽,抽条 | |
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34 germinate | |
v.发芽;发生;发展 | |
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35 pampered | |
adj.饮食过量的,饮食奢侈的v.纵容,宠,娇养( pamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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36 wasps | |
黄蜂( wasp的名词复数 ); 胡蜂; 易动怒的人; 刻毒的人 | |
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37 Fertilized | |
v.施肥( fertilize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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38 caterpillars | |
n.毛虫( caterpillar的名词复数 );履带 | |
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39 cocoons | |
n.茧,蚕茧( cocoon的名词复数 )v.茧,蚕茧( cocoon的第三人称单数 ) | |
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40 iridescent | |
adj.彩虹色的,闪色的 | |
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41 moths | |
n.蛾( moth的名词复数 ) | |
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42 vocal | |
adj.直言不讳的;嗓音的;n.[pl.]声乐节目 | |
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