noon
It fell off and on for a week , and when it ceased and the wind hauled again to the north-west , autumn had come . The autumn ! And it seemed as though spring were here but yesterday . The grain was yet unripe , though yellowed by the drought ; nothing save the hay was in barn ; the other crops could draw nutriment from the soil only while the too brief summer warmed it , and already autumn was here , the forerunner of relentless winter , of the frosts , and soon the snows ... Between the wet days there was still fine bright weather , hot toward noon , when one might fancy that all was as it had been : the harvest still unreaped , the changeless setting of spruces and firs , and ever the same sunsets of gray and opal , opal and gold , and skies of misty blue above the same dark woodland . But in the mornings the grass was sometimes white with rime , and swiftly followed the earliest dry frosts which killed and blackened the tops of the potatoes . Then , for the first time , a film of ice appeared upon the drinking-trough ; melted by the afternoon sun it was there a few days later , and yet a third time in the same week . Frequent changes of wind brought an alternation of mild rainy days and frosty mornings ; but every time the wind came afresh from the north-west it was a little colder , a little more remindful of the icy winter blasts .