Part 40

Moan, oh ye autumn winds! Summer has fled,

The flowers have closed their tender leaves and die; The lily's gracious head All low must lie, Because the gentle Summer now is dead.

Mourn, mourn, oh autumn winds, Lament and mourn; How many half-blown buds must close and die; Hopes with the Summer born All faded lie, And leave us desolate and earth forlorn!

A. A. Procter.

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ST. SIMON AND ST. JUDE'S DAY. (October 28th.)

It is a Bedford custom for boys to cry baked pears about the town, with the following words:--

Who knows what I have got? In a hot pot? Baked Wardens--all hot! Who knows what I have got?

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October brings the cold weather down, When the wind and the rain continue; He nerves the limbs that are lazy grown, And braces the languid sinew; So while we have voices and lungs to cheer, And the winter frost before us, Come chant to the king of the mortal year, And thunder him out in chorus.

E. E. Bowen.

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"Decay, decay," the wildering west winds cry; "Decay, decay," the moaning woods reply; The whole dead autumn landscape, drear and chill, Strikes the same chord of desolate sadness still.

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Full moon in October without frost, no frost till full moon in November.

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Hoar frost and gipsies never stay nine days in a place.

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There are always nineteen fine days in October.

Kentish saying.

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An April frost Is sharp, but kills not; sad October's storm Strikes when the juices and the vital sap Are ebbing from the leaf.

Henry Taylor.

NOVEMBER

Ancient Cornish name: Miz-dui, black month.

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Jewel for the month: Topaz. Fidelity.

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