[Gutenberg 63876] • Milly · At Love's Extremes · A Romance of the Southland

A man stood on the jutting shoulder of a mountain over-looking a long, narrow valley, whose scattering houses and irregular farm-plats, seen through the clear air of that high region, appeared scarcely a gun-shot distant, when in fact they were miles away. It was early morning; the sun had barely cleared the highest peaks in the east, and the land-scape, albeit a mid-winter one, was wonderfully rich in col-ors. On the oak trees the leaves still clung in heavy brown, green and russet masses; the hickory forests, though leaf-less, made bits of tender gray along the lower valley-slopes, whilst high up toward the mountain tops, the billowy wil-derness of pines, cedars and chestnut trees added their var-iegated patch-work that gradually rose and shaded off into the blue of distance.