Jasper County Democrat, Volume 18, Number 63, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 November 1915 — Glories of Autumn In Brown County. [ARTICLE]

Glories of Autumn In Brown County.

Poets sing of the spring time, when the grass is green, the leaves are young, and the flowers are in bloom; but the painter and the real lover of nature rave when the beauties of autumn are on display. True, there is an ever-recurring mysticism in the rebirth of vegetation; but it is ever the same. Sunshine, warmth and showers clothe the* earth with green when the winter vanishes. In the autumn, however, there are changes so marked mat no two years are ever alike. One year the scarlet of the sassafras leaf may be less defined, the brown of the beech paler, the creeper not so red, the elm not such a greenish yellow, the maple less brilliant, and the oak less ruddy. Another year the leaves of the trees and vines may be flam ing or a deeper yellow, and yet another year the leaves may be shriveled in a night, while they ' are still green, by a killing frost, and fall to the ground with the next day's wind

and sunshine, with no opportunity to show what they can do in gorgeous coloring.

When the black frost does not kill suddenly, and autumn lingers, as has been the case this year, the leaves assume a wide variety of coloring, from pale green to almpst black, and they remain on the trees longer. This season the leaves were more plentiful because there was.an abundance of moisture and less scorching heat than in many other seasons. When the weather is extremely hot and there is little rain, the leaves shrivel and frequently drop before autumn begins. Rain tends to make vegetation more rank —of quicker and stronger growth. The stems of leaves are stronger in wet seasons, and therefore they cling to the branches with greater tenacity, as may be seen in a walk through the woods or a ride along a forest. In a very dry season the trees are often bare by the middle of Oatober; but this year, at the end of the month, half the leaves in some unexposqd woods were still clinging to the branches. It is in the early fall of a dry year, however, that nature shows her greatest coloring powers—produces the most glaring reds and yellows. This year, the autumn of a wet year, though the colors were not brilliant, they were more varied, with more shades of green shown,

than in the last decade. Take the road through Millersville and then along the banks of Fall creek—what a riot of colors! The peted in brown, and stidll there in pale greens, dark greens, light yellows and browns, not brilliant, but so marked in contrasts that the nature lover lingered to admire. And so it. was on the return drive along the banks of White river in Hamilton county. But it was on an auto trip through the corners of Johnson, Morgan, Hendricks and Marion counties that the glories of autumn were seen at their best. Last Saturday was a wonder day for a party of city-tired workers. As had been done before, the main highways were shunned as much as possible, and the auto sped most of the time over byways where the trees were thickest. Woods and roadsides were carfeted in brown, and still there were enough leaves on the trees to decorate the landscape. Every byway was a surprise. Up hill and down hill, on each side of the road-

way, were acres of forest trees sandwished between fields' of corn in shocks, brown stubble, newly plowed ground, or fields of recently sprouted wheat, which, in the distance, seemed a? if they were carpets oi green velvet. So lost was the party in admiration of the scene that when the forager picked Ben Davis apples, thinking they were winesaps or Jonathans, he was not scolded, except for the waste of. time; and even ’when after leaving Mooresville, a tangle of byways running in all directions put the party in a quandary, just before nightfall, as to which was the right way honie, there was not a murmur—the scenery was still to be admired. Danville, in ithe distance, showed that therel was life somewhere, even if most of the country homes’ displayed no light. And what this party saw was seen by hundreds of others. Just think of 600 auto parties i n the hills and valleys of Brown county in one day! —lndianapolis News.

Oporto, Portugal, now has 200, 000 inhabitants. Modern submarines usually carry six or eight torpedoes. - of disabled Canadians vary from $75 to $265 a year. A British private can get as much as $325 a year pension for his wounds, according to their nature.