They’s something kindo’ harty-like about the atmusfere When the heat of summer’s over and the coolin’ fall is here— Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees, And the mumble of the hummin’-birds and buzzin’ of the bees; But the air’s so appetizin’; and the landscape through the haze Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days Is a pictur’ that no painter has the colorin’ to mock— When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock. The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn, And the raspin’ of the tangled leaves as golden as the morn; The stubble in the furries—kindo’ lonesome-like, but still A-preachin’ sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill; The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed; The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover overhead!— O, it sets my hart a-clickin’ like the tickin’ of a clock, When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock. Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps Is poured around the cellar-floor in red and yaller heaps; And your cider-makin’s over, and your wimmern-folks is through With theyr mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and sausage too!... I don’t know how to tell it—but ef such a thing could be As the angels wantin’ boardin’, and they’d call around on _me_— I’d want to ’commodate ’em—all the whole-indurin’ flock— When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock. A PARTING GUEST[8] What delightful hosts are they— Life and Love! Lingeringly I turn away, This late hour, yet glad enough They have not withheld from me Their high hospitality. So, with face lit with delight And all gratitude, I stay Yet to press their hands and say, “Thanks.—So fine a time! Good night.” _Eugene Field_ Although born (September 3, 1850) in St. Louis, Missouri, Eugene Field belongs to the literature of the far West. Colorado and the Rocky Mountain region claimed him as their own and Field never repudiated the allegiance; he even called most of his poetry “Western Verse.”