Autumn is a story book. But the

Autumn is a story book. But the story belongs to the forests, to the nills and to Rappahannock. Each month unfolds a new and more mid chapter. Each week is a catalogue of excitement and drama. Pioneers called the season Pall. Country folks make it the fathering, a time for Storage. Its beauty is bewitching, enticing crowds from the drab grey of city existence to the spectacle of an evening sky running blood red. Autumn is mystery, - a time of questions; why does the sycamore turn yellow, and the self same chlorophyll in the neighboring gum don a glisteming red? What causes the grey squirrels’ August madness, - a mania that chews off green hickory nuts, - nuts that won’t mature for weeks? How do the flocks arrange a place for gathering and a day of departure? What is the strange urge that drives both man and beast to gather and to store? How does the Autumn wind spin the browning leaves in tiny spirals - magic that sends the cat skipping about in crazy mimicry. The dog days are over. But it’s the first sweet smell of wood smoke that tells folks grasshopper summer has passed. The squash vines are dead - thank Heaven! From the first katy-did until the last pumpkin pie, impressions of Fall will mount. Like the proprietor of a curio shop, memory will store collectors’ items for winter reflections. August is the first of corn time. Sun-licked men and huge contraptions reduce the standing fields into bite-sized fodder. Change is typical of the season. Chill has silenced the whip-poorwill but awakened the raucous bluejay, the bob white and his covey. Cooler nights have slowed the early rising groundhog, and the fish don’t jump in the pond anymore because it’s September.

September - October a time for reverence and a time to work. The blackened heads of second crop clover drive men into late evening baleing. The disappearing sun drops into a huge cauldron beyond the Ridge, splashing great shafts of gold aloft. Abruptly the mood changes as pink and rose race unrestrained over heaven’s archway, and awe struck man wonders that Nature forgets which is West and which is East. Twilight deepens and the lady turns to admire that last beautiful rose of summer and she thinks of love and a marriage performed years before. The days roll on. Theres work in the orchards. The calves go to market and granddad

Birth Announced

Mr. and Mrs. Walter E. Krause, jr. of Front Royal announce the birth of a daughter, Kimberly Sue, on October 25, 1971 at Winchester Memorial Hospital. Grandparents are Mr. and Mrs. Fred Pearson of Front Royal and Mrs. Mary M. Krause of Flint Hill.

Card of Thank*

We wish to thank all of our friends and relatives for the consideration and many acts of kindness shown us and our family during our stay in the hospital and upon our return home.

Mrs. Joyce Settle

and daughter Joyce Ann

Castleton, Va.