A Letter-Picture

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 274, 15 August 1936, Page 27

A Letter-Picture

Our young gumtree is flowering red against the dark river water below, aud the bulbs are coming out arouud the bare apple trees, and the wild finches and waxeyes come to our bird-table each day. In late afternoon when I come home, the pathways among the pines are ali damp, and the tree-trunks dark and wet, and a fine smell of fir balsam and cold earth makes me think of little furry animals, and cone fires, and places «■ where the glossed ferns grow. Most days now the harbour entrance is full of rain, and the valley, too, so that •we look across and see the tops of the hills muffled, so it seems, up to their chins in soft wool, or entirely veiled in tulle. Most times, too, the rain beats on the windows and makes me glad of my books, which tell of the wild ducks, with paintings of them in flight across skies torn with lightning and streaked with rain. Don’t you like ducks and the way they fly with outstreached neck, and have you noticed the noise of the pigeon’s wings as it passes overhead? The hills I like too, when the sunlight and shadows chase along their chequered yellow and green ; and the gulls, struggling down to the sea again from furrows inland against astrong head wind. Perhaps they have been swooping after the plough while the old draught horse pulls heavily through the loam and the man behind'looks along the furrow and brushes his face with his sleeve. When I look out now I see another shower of rain running up from the heads over a sea which is the playing-field of hundreds of white horses rolling and tossing their heads. I think the beach would be a desolate place to-day, with the rain and spray and wind, and cold grey sand.- I like it best in summer, with the sparkling blue, and gold sand, and sun. — Santorin (16), Melling.