gray days deprived him of all courage.  And then he remembered suddenly how a villager’s horse coming from market had tripped and fallen by the roadside.  Would that he, too, might fall by the roadside, so weary was he.  ’If I could only make known my suffering, she would take pity on me; but no one knows another’s suffering.’  He walked from his window sighing, and a moment after stopped in front of his writing-table.  Perhaps it was the writing-table that put the thought into his mind that she might like to read a description of an Irish autumn.

 From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Nora Glynn.

’GARRANARD, BOHOLA,

’September.

’You know the wind is hardly ever at rest about the hilltop on which my house stands.  Even in summer the wind sighs, a long, gentle little sigh, sometimes not unpleasant to hear.  You used to speak of an AEolian harp, and say that I should place one on my window-sill.  A doleful instrument it must be—­loud wailing sound in winter-time, and in the summer a little sigh.  But in these autumn days an AEolian harp would be mute.  There is not wind enough to-day on the hillside to cause the faintest vibration.  Yesterday I went for a long walk in the woods, and I can find no words that would convey an idea of the stillness.  It is easy to speak of a tomb, but it was more than that.  The dead are dead, and somnambulism is more mysterious than death.  The season seemed to stand on the edge of a precipice, will-less, like a sleep-walker.  Now and then the sound of a falling leaf caught my ear, and I shall always remember how a crow, flying high overhead towards the mountains, uttered an ominous “caw”; another crow answered, and there was silence again.  The branches dropped, and the leaves hung out at the end of long stems.  One could not help pitying the trees, though one knew one’s pity was vain.

’As I wandered in Derrinrush, I came suddenly upon some blood-red beech-trees, and the hollow was full of blood-red leaves.  You have been to Derrinrush:  you know how mystic and melancholy the wood is, full of hazels and Druid stones.  After wandering a long while I turned into a path.  It led me to a rough western shore, and in front of me stood a great Scotch fir.  The trunk has divided, and the two crowns showed against the leaden sky.  It has two birch-trees on either side, and their graceful stems and faint foliage, pale like gold, made me think of dancers with sequins in their hair and sleeves.  There seemed to be nothing but silence in the wood, silence, and leaves ready to fall.  I had not spoken to anyone for a fortnight—­I mean I had no conversation with anyone—­and my loneliness helped me to perceive the loneliness of the wood, and the absence of birds made me feel it.  The lake is never without gulls, but I didn’t see one yesterday.  “The swallows are gone,” I said; “the wild geese will soon be here,” and I remembered their doleful cry as I scrambled under some blackthorn bushes, glad to get out of the