Indian summer

“ Yet the Indian summer now as then wraps the hills in its mellow tints; the grass grows brown and rusty as each autumn fills its measure, and the days, as in the long-ago, are as grand as the golden sunshine of that incomparable season of the Great Plains ever lighted up; the mirage, as of old, weaves its fantastic forms out of the charming landscape, and under certain atmospheric conditions a man on top of one of the Twin Mounds will appear, as does the specter of the Brocken, like a huge giant in mid-air. ”

“ Not a breath of wind, not a cloud in the sky; a great peace and stillness over all. Nowhere else in the world was there anything so wonderful. It was Indian Summer.
Now it was that the fishermen who set their nets in the North worked hard and fast, knowing the time was at hand when the South Wind would fall asleep, and fierce old Ka-bib-on-okka would swoop down upon them and drive them away. Sure enough! One morning a thin film of ice covered the water where they set their nets; a heavy frost sparkled in the sun on the bark roof of their huts. ”

“ Life has a long Indian summer still, but it's never again the real thing,—that ripening toward fruition; that ecstasy of expansion and growth. There is no visible change for a while, yet every day there is an imperceptible fall in the temperature. Always the nights are growing longer. The flowers drop away one by one—the sap sinks a little, leaving the extreme delicate twigs moribund. No one has seen the leaves fall, yet there are fewer upon the bough—winter is coming. ”

“ INDIAN SUMMER A silken curtain veils the skies,
And half conceals from pensive eyes
The bronzing tokens of the fall;
A calmness broods upon the hills,
And summer's parting dream distils
A charm of silence over all.
The stacks of corn, in brown array,
Stand waiting through the tranquil day,
Like tattered wigwams on the plain;
The tribes that find a shelter there
Are phantom peoples, forms of air,
And ghosts of vanished joy and pain.
At evening when the crimson crest
Of sunset passes down the West,
I hear the whispering host returning ”

“ Lovelier than the Indian summer, for mingled with all things is the consciousness of the flowering and fruiting to come. The Indian summer has a sweet sadness. The spring is full of hope and promise, and the heart buds with the flowers.
Out in the midst of all this country springtime freshness, our 'Hermitage' looks up from its shrubberies and rejoices within itself, and does not care for the traveler's careless glances. The traveler may call it stupid and ugly, if he calls it at all ”

“ And, breathing softly from the mild South-west,
The Indian Summer mitigates the air,
Me it delights, leaving the towers of men,
With devious feet, and void of fixed intent,
To wander far into the country still;
My path, some grassy road untrodden lone,
Which leads the steps through woods of dwarfish pines,
Where dwells unscared the solitary jay,
And sings the cricket, sole inhabitants.
In these sweet solitudes the soul becomes
Tranquil as seas mid happy isles embayed ”

“ A week or two elapsed, and then succeeded that gentler season which bears among us the name of the Indian summer; when a light haze rests upon the morning landscape, and the many-colored woods seem wrapped in the thin drapery of a veil; when the air is mild and calm as that of early June, and at evening the sun goes down amid a warm, voluptuous beauty, that may well outrival the softest tints of Italy. ”

“ INDIAN SUMMER AFTER the Summer's ripe maturity has vanished with the first autumnal storm, there steals over the world a magical Presence. It has no place in the almanac; it comes with a flooding of amber light and a deepening of amethyst haze; it plays like a passing smile on the face of the universe and like one, vanishes with the stern rebuff of the wintry blast. ”

“ Indian summer on the high plateaus of the continent's crest there is none, but instead, a breathing space of life-giving days, with the bouquet of fine old wine in the keen-edged air, and of frosty nights when the stars swing clear in illimitable space. ”

“ Previously to its commencement, and during the continuance of what in this country is called Indian Summer, the face of nature is expressive of pleasing melancholy; the sun divested of his ordinary radiance, courts our gaze—the prevailing stillness is only invaded by the falling leaf—and every phasis in which we behold her, is serene and tranquil. ”

“ The Indian summer, which, in November, comes like breathing space, ere the mighty power of winter sweeps o'er the earth, is beautiful, with its balmy airs and soft bright skies, yet melancholy in its loveliness as a fair face in death—'tis the last smile of summer, and when the last wreath of crimson leaves fall to earth, the erratic birds take their flight to warmer lands—the bear retires to his hollow tree—the squirrel to his winter stores—and man calls forth all his genius to make him independent of the storm king's power. ”

“ The day, immeasurably long, sleeps over the broad hills and warm wide fields. To have lived through all its sunny hours, seems longevity enough." Yet does not the very name of Indian summer imply the superiority of the summer itself,—the real, the true summer, "when the young corn is bursting into ear; the awned heads of rye, wheat, and barley, and the nodding panicles of oats, shoot from their green and glaucous stems, in broad, level, and waving expanses of present beauty and future promise. ”

“ They are white buntings, and their presence here is like a chill, for they come from the icy regions of the North, and they bring the snow upon their wings. The Indian summer is soon a thing of the past. Perhaps before another daybreak it will have flown. There is no dawn upon that morning. The night runs into a day of dismal, cheerless twilight, and the sky is overcast with ominous darkness. ”

“ The snow keeps off unusually. The landscape is of the color of a russet apple, which has no golden cheek. The sunset sky supplies that. But, though it is crude to bite, it yields a pleasant acid flavor. The year looks back to summer, and a summer smile is reflected in her face. There is in these days a coolness in the air which makes me hesitate to call them Indian summer. ”

“ There has been a great deal of ill feeling about Indian summer, and the kinder way is not to persecute those who have since youth believed and will maintain forever that it comes in October. Victims of this perverted fancy, they will go through life calling the first hot spell after Labor Day Indian summer. Every fall one explains to them that this brief season of perfection may come as late as Thanksgiving, but the very next year they will be heard to murmur, under frostless skies, “Well, we are having our Indian summer.” ”

“ We do not know here that special season which across the Atlantic is called the Indian summer,—that last glow of the year's warmth which always brings with it a half melancholy conviction of the year's decay,—which in itself is so delightful, would be so full of delight, were it not for the consciousness which it seems to contain of being the immediate precursor of winter with all its horrors. ”

“ The Indian summer, said to be more remarkable in this country than elsewhere, no less than the reblossoming of certain flowers, the peep of the hylodes, and sometimes the faint warble of some birds, is the reminiscence or rather the return of spring, the year renewing its youth. ”

“ When the hot Indian summer draws to a close, the whole land is parched and athirst for rain; rivers are low and many hill streams have dried up; man and beast are weary and await release in the breathless enervating atmosphere ”

“ Even in America, the Indian Summer of life should be a little sunny and a little sad, like the season, and infinite in wealth and depth of tone--but never hustled. ”

“ There is nothing very enticing in the low, flat shores, or the interminable marshes, or the cormorants standing in a row on the beach; but over all, lying warm and lovingly, is the soft haze of the Indian summer, giving the country a look, not like spring, for that has life and effort, and the feeling of spring is bounding ”

“ With the "Indian summer," there comes over all things a strange quiet. No wind disturbs the atmosphere; the sun shines, but you see little of him. His presence is indicated rather by a mellowness overspreading and enriching the picture, than by any brightness or glare. A hazy film rests on earth and sky. ”

“ The glory of the Indian summer is wholly ethereal; it belongs to the light and the air; and is a striking image and eloquent testimony of how far spirit can overmaster matter. The earth is brown, the trees are bare ”

“ But if we were disappointed here, Price’s promise of Indian summer was abundantly fulfilled when once we had waded through the snow in the great primeval forests that cover the northern slopes of the Mogollons, and made the abrupt descent of the “rimrock.” It was like the contrast of Florida with our Northern winter. The live-oak and budding cottonwood and the warm sun and sprouting grass gave us royal welcome from the cold and snow beyond; and, at the end of the first day’s journey in this region, we came out upon a ranch. ”

“ I hear you to my garden say good-bye.
A sudden wind—the pale rose-petals blow
Hither and yon—or are they flakes of snow?
Antoinette De Coursey Patterson INDIAN SUMMER
Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer,
Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing,
Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects,
Ceaseless, insistent.
The grasshopper's horn, and far off, high in the maples
The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence,
Under the moon waning and worn and broken,
Tired with summer. ”

“ The popular belief that Indian summer weather was predicted by the native Indians in conversation with the first European settlers finds no documentary corroboration, and the idea that the term Indian summer was employed by the early settlers seems to be a myth. ”

“ The snows have piled high the parchment of winter—a shroud for the deathless dead—whiter than the white slabs. Summer has succeeded summer, and all the June days since that day of terrific annihilation have poured their white suns upon these white milestones of the nation's destiny—the only requiem, the winds of winter, and in summer the liquid notes of the meadow lark. In all the argument and controversy that has shifted the various factors of the fight over the checkerboard of contention, the voice of the Indian has hitherto been hopelessly silent. ”

“ On some of these days Nature smiles in{152} delight over her success, and we say, this is the real Indian summer. She is pleased with the perfection and profuseness of the product. On others you will see her eyes cloud with tears, and sometimes a perfect passion of northeast tempest blots the landscape and drowns the world in a flood of rain. ”

“ The Indian summer, which had been as a gentle mist or veil upon the beauty of the time, had gone away a little—retired, as it were, into the hills and back country, to allow the undimmed heaven to shine down upon the happy festival of families and nations. The cattle stood still in the fields without a low ”

“ Summer was gone and now Indian summer. The grass was cold and there was no mist and no dew. After he left she would go in and light the gas and close the shatters, and he would go down the path and on to the village. To these two life had come quickly and gone, leaving not bitterness, but pity; not disillusion, but only pain. ”

“ This charming season is called the Indian Summer, a name which is derived from the natives, who believe that it is caused by a wind which comes immediately from the court of their great and benevolent God Cantantowan, or the Southwestern God; the God who is superior to all other beings, who sends them every blessing which they enjoy, and to whom the souls of their fathers go after their decease. ”

“ The white settlers on the frontiers found no peace from Indian alarms and onsets save in the winter. From spring to the early part of the autumn, the settlers, cooped up in the forts, or ever at watch in their fields, had no security or comfort. The approach of winter was hailed as a jubilee in cabin and farm, with bustle and hilarity. But after the first set-in of winter aspects came a longer or shorter interval of warm, smoky, hazy weather, which would tempt the Indians—as if a brief return of summer—to renew their incursions on the frontiers. ”

“ The Indian summer is so called because, at the particular period of the year in which it obtains, the Indians break up their village communities, and go to the interior to prepare for their winter hunting. ”

“ I think the notion entertained by some travellers, that the Indian summer is caused by the annual conflagration of forests by those Indians inhabiting the unexplored regions beyond the larger lakes is absurd. ”

“ Summer in the Indian Plains
THE fiery feet of Summer march in haste
⁠Across the fields swept bare of ripened grain,
And all the garden lies a barren waste
⁠Beneath her scorching steps, athirst for rain. ”

“ It is called Indian summer, because it occurs at a season when the natives gathered in their crops of maize or Indian corn. The atmosphere is smoky, and so mellows the sunlight that every object wears the livery of repose, like the landscapes of Southern Italy. ”

“ Each Winter the "good Indians" were mild and gentle. But with the warmth of Spring and the fruitfulness of summer, with the green grasses of the Plains for their ponies, with wild game in the open, and the labor of the industrious settler of the unprotected frontier as a stake for the effort, the "good Indian" came forth from his reservation. ”