Now sober August comes—the scene,
Beneath the Summer's sun still fair;
The woods have changed their shade of green,
New scents are floating on the air.
The farmer rests—the harvest o'er,
Awhile from labor's steady strain;
The season's crops are all in store,
The barns well filled with hay and grain.
The Summer months are nearly past,
Regretted much, they glide away,
And now we enter on the last;
A blessed trinity are they!
The lazy cattle in the shade
Of friendly trees at noonday lie;
Or, roused by swarming insects, wade
In stream that passes murmuring by.
A parching drouth consumes the land,
Deep Hes the dust in all the roads,
How closely every cloud is scanned!
The sultry heat a storm forebodes.
The rumbling thunder's warning sound,
Faint in the distance now we hear,
With stifling air and thirsty ground,
A welcome note it strikes the ear.
The storm comes on, the drouth is gone,
Refreshing floods of rain descend;
All night it pours—another dawn
Breaks slowly ere the showers end.
The drouth is gone, but with it all
The glory of the Summer-time;
The leaves will soon begin to fall,
The season now has passed its prime.
The tall corn, bending in the gale,
The cooler night, the shortening day;
All Nature's voices tell the tale—
The Summer passes soon away!
The fields of corn that ripen slow,
Of Autumn speak, and breezes all,
That o'er the fields of stubble blow,
Proclaim the coming of the Fall.
