<h2><span class="h2line1">THE COMING OF THE HOAR FROST</span></h2>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p12.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="465" /> <p class="caption">28. Moss-like hoar frost deposited upon surface of pond</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p12a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="452" /> <p class="caption">29. Columnar hoar frost scattered over brook ice</p> </div>
<h2 id="c2"><span class="h2line1">CHAPTER II</span> <br/><span class="h2line2">THE COMING OF THE HOAR FROST</span></h2>
<div class="verse">
<p class="t0">“Rustily creak the crickets;</p>
<p class="t0">Jack Frost came down last night—</p>
<p class="t0">He came on the wings of a star beam,</p>
<p class="t0">Cool and sparkling and bright;</p>
<p class="t0">He sought in the grass for the crickets</p>
<p class="t0">With delicate icy spear,</p>
<p class="t0">So sharp and so fine and so fatal,</p>
<p class="t0">And he stabbed them far and near.</p>
<p class="t0">Pray what have you done to the flowers?</p>
<p class="t0">Where hides the wood aster?</p>
<p class="t0">She vanished as snow wreathes dissolve in the sun</p>
<p class="t0">The moment you touched her.”</p>
<p class="lr">—<span class="sc">Thaxter.</span></p>
</div>
<p>When autumn has reached the zenith
of perfection, when the milkweeds
and thistles which grow thick in the hedges
have cast their gossamer, fairy-like seeds
to the winds, and the goldenrod which
flaunted its yellow banners so brightly
through those last long, perfect days of
dying autumn, has at last begun to fade,
the first warning which we have of the
approach of the frost is all at once seen
in certain mysterious changes of colour
which have taken place in the foliage of the
trees. Then we know that upon that
last still night, when the stars snapped
and sparkled so brilliantly, and the air
felt unusually keen and crisp, that the
Hoar-frost Spirit must have been abroad,
and in passing, touched all the trees and
plants very lightly with his magic wand.
Out in the garden the sturdy sunflowers
droop their seed-filled crowns a trifle, while
the hollyhocks seem to stand less primly
and firmly, and lean together as though
for support. They have felt the blighting
touch of that magic wand. He touched
also the tips of the maple leaves upon
the hillside, and left upon some of them
just a little dab of his crimson brushwork;
they form a touch of brilliant colour
against the darkly massed pines and hemlocks
in the background. But shortly they
will flame forth upon every hillside, one
vast torch, lighted to do honour to the
passing of autumn; and all the work of
the Frost Spirit.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p13.jpg" alt="" width-obs="335" height-obs="700" /> <p class="caption">30. An odd hoar-frost formation</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p13a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="417" /> <p class="caption">31. Detailed tabular hoar frost—grew slowly</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p13c.jpg" alt="" width-obs="389" height-obs="700" /> <p class="caption">32. Detailed tabular hoar-frost crystals</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p13d.jpg" alt="" width-obs="500" height-obs="395" /> <p class="caption">33. Cup form hoar frost</p> </div>
<p>The little sour fox-grapes which grow
in the hedge-rows, are now piquant in
flavour, and have acquired something which
they lacked before, and are pleasant to
the taste since the hoar frost’s visit to
them. The bitter-sweet berries which grow
close beside them, tangled and twisted
with the gray, fluffed-out clematis plumes,
have burst their orange-coloured sheaths,
and gleam more vividly than before. And
the great green chestnut burs are bursting,
just a trifle; they need one more, slightly
sharper touch from the hoar frost, and then
the plump, brown, satin-skinned nuts will
come tumbling out of their burs to the
ground. The eager squirrels have already
begun to collect their winter supplies.
They are early at work, even before the
magical display created by the hoar frost
has been touched by the sun. They mean
to get ahead of the children in their nut
gathering, if possible.</p>
<p>If you too, would rise with the squirrels,
and go forth into the open fields and woods,
you will be amply repaid for the small
effort which it cost you, for the display
which the delicate hoar frost makes upon
a clear morning in early autumn, when
first touched by the sunrise, is really
fantastic and wonderfully beautiful.</p>
<p>If you happen to be in the country,
direct your steps across the pasture lands,
where the short thick grass is powdered
heavily with the hoar frost, and do not
fail to pause at the old, gray rail fence,
leading into the cornfield, to study the
fine effects, the magic work which the Frost
Spirit has left there during the night. The
withered brown shocks of corn, standing
in suggestive, witch-like attitudes, scattered
over the fields, each lance-like rustling
blade tipped with a steely, glittering
coat of frost; while between the leaning
stacks gleam great golden pumpkins, as
yet unharvested, each golden sphere gleaming
through a bluish-white deposit of hoar
frost, or frozen dew.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p14.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="771" /> <p class="caption">34a. Columnar hoar-frost crystals</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p14a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="789" /> <p class="caption">34b. Columnar hoar frost (tabular)</p> </div>
<p>Unquestionably, James Whitcomb Riley
had in mind a similar scene when he was
inspired to pen the homely lines so often
quoted:</p>
<div class="verse">
<p class="t0">“When the frost is on the punkin,</p>
<p class="t0">And the fodder’s in the shock.”</p>
</div>
<p>The beauties and peculiarities of the
hoar-frost crystals are a distinctly separate
study in themselves, as they do not belong,
nor are they classified with the heavier
frosts of late and mid-winter, such as
we find in the extreme cold weather
deposited upon our window-panes and
elsewhere.</p>
<p>The hoar frost is in reality the dew
particles or molecules of water in the air,
which, when the temperature falls below
32°, freezes and collects, and thus forms
a deposit of hoar frost upon nearly all
surfaces which it encounters.</p>
<p>Still another variety of hoar frost is that
which forms mysteriously under some covering;
occasionally we find it deposited
upon a bit of wood which has lain under
the snow; it forms upon the underside
of the wood, or that part resting upon the
ground, and is caused by the moisture
of the earth, which collects, and which
the temperature converts into crystals
of hoar frost.</p>
<p>Special and interesting examples of hoar-frost
formations are given in the photographic
illustrations, which, being taken
with a camera having a microscopic attachment
are, for the most part, largely
magnified. The detail and formation of
the hoar-frost crystal is most delicate,
and well worthy of study, and the curious
manner in which some of them are found,
also the many different shapes which they
assume, clearly shows that each formation
is possessed of certain individuality of
structural form peculiar to its environments,
and the surrounding objects to
which it may attach itself.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p15.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="440" /> <p class="caption">35. Linear window-pane frost. A common type</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p15a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="446" /> <p class="caption">36. Showing initials crudely scratched upon glass, which frost has elaborated</p> </div>
<p>An especially interesting type of crystal
is that which grows in queer needle-like
layers, somewhat suggestive of tiny stalactite
growths; this variety we frequently
discover in gravelly or peaty soil, while
it sometimes raises and supports upon its
points large sections of earth and stones.</p>
<p>These needle-like columnar formations,
which are excellently portrayed in the
illustrations, are often found from two
to six inches in height, and are formed
from the moisture which rises from the
warm soil and freezes. These columnar
crystals do not form in this manner in the
extremely cold weather, or after the ground
has become solidly frozen to a certain
depth; therefore they may be classed
among the hoar-frost formations of early
autumn.</p>
<p>As shown in detail in the photographs,
the formation of each section of this type
of hoar-frost crystal appears as a prism-like
columnar growth, the base of the
prism being hexagonal in shape, and closely
resembling an unset jewel.</p>
<p>Through the still, cool nights in autumn
the Hoar-frost Fairy works steadily, covering
vegetation with glittering frost-work,
touching all unsightly places, decaying
woods, old gray fence-rails lightly in passing,
and upon the following morning, if you are
fortunately stirring before the sun ruins
the best work of the hoar frost, you will
discover many wonderful works of art.
Sometimes it will be a miniature, scintillating
forest of needle-like crystals attaching
itself to some old rail. Again a perfectly
marvellous collection which you may find
deposited upon a board; tiny tabular ice
crystals of hoar frost closely resembling
a flight of white butterflies or moths
powdered over its flat surface. We were
fortunately able to secure one of this type;
and with the aid of a small pocket microscope,
you may be able to discover this
pleasing variety, as shown in our photograph.
The same variety of hoar frost
was again encountered, where the delicate
crystals had formed and grouped themselves
upon a stick or straw; this is wonderfully
suggestive of a group of butterflies
resting upon a flower-stalk, as we
frequently observe them in mid-summer,
where flights of the yellow wayside butterflies
assemble upon a mullein-stalk in
precisely the same fashion.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p16.jpg" alt="" width-obs="456" height-obs="800" /> <p class="caption">37. An exquisite lace pattern in frost</p> </div>
<p>The showy illustration resembling in
formation a branch of bleached coral, is
another interesting example of the hoar
frost’s eccentric development, and was found
clinging to a decaying beam, under an old
building.</p>
<p>The beautiful feathery spray, somewhat
resembling a miniature fir tree, was taken
from the branch of a tree, about which it
had formed, and is made up of countless,
lace-like, filmy ice prisms, of infinite delicacy.</p>
<p>Much is lost in the scintillating iridescence
of these frail hoar-frost crystals when seen
merely in the photographs, for they frequently
show rare colour effects when
seen in the open.</p>
<p>That the hoar frost sometimes takes
strange freaks is shown in the exquisitely
beautiful deposits occasionally found upon
the edges of a piece of broken ice. Sometimes
you will discover it upon the thin,
new ice which forms upon small streams
in the early autumn, and in gullies beside
the road. This ice is short-lived, and
readily breaks at the slightest touch, with
the crackling sound of broken glass. A
section of this thin ice is shown, about
the ragged edge of which the hoar frost
has arranged itself in fantastic fashion.
The dark waters of the brook may be seen
through the opening.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p17.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="443" /> <p class="caption">38. A beautiful example of two distinct types.</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p17a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="594" height-obs="436" /> <p class="caption">39. Fern-like scrolls, delicate background.</p> </div>
<p>Hoar frost which gathers upon the grass
blades, unlike the deposit of the dew,
does not form noticeably upon the tips of
the blades; on the contrary, the hoar frost
gathers in an apparently greater and heavier
degree the nearer to the earth it approaches.
Flat-leaved, low-growing plants are usually
well covered with hoar-frost crystals, while
about the edges of certain leaves a heavy
decoration of film-like crystals is sometimes
seen.</p>
<p>Frequently upon a pond of frozen water
we come across a queer moss-like fungus
deposit scattered at intervals over the
surface of the ice. This is still another
type of hoar-frost formation. Still another
is the columnar frost crystal, which
is formed of clusters of needles, and these
loose, needle-like formations we frequently
find scattered over the surface of thin
brook ice.</p>
<p>During your rambles in the autumn,
after the arrival of the hoar frost, it would
prove a pastime as well as an instructive
nature study, to search out and locate
the many different varieties of hoar frost.
Be sure to take a small pocket microscope
or reading lens with you. Search diligently
in unexpected places, beneath blocks
of wood, about decaying logs and old tree
stumps, for in all sorts of out of the way
places you will encounter them. Under
the edge of a stone, imbedded even in the
snow, and scattered over the surface of
frozen pond and brook. The Frost Spirit
seeks all sorts of strange nooks and crannies
in which to deposit its fascinating mushroom
growths.</p>
<p>Nature has in store for us many strange,
agreeable surprises. Among them there
is much to be discovered and learned about
these delicate fantastic creations deposited
by the Hoar-frost Spirit.</p>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p18.jpg" alt="" width-obs="600" height-obs="439" /> <p class="caption">40. A perfect fern leaf</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p18a.jpg" alt="" width-obs="451" height-obs="700" /> <p class="caption">41. Raised fern-like arrangement</p> </div>
<div class="fig"><ANTIMG src="images/p18b.jpg" alt="" width-obs="344" height-obs="699" /> <p class="caption">42. Showing in detail granular frost drawing away from true frost crystals</p> </div>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />
1 of 2
2 of 2
Previous
Next
Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.