The lions were feeding.

Those who have observed sunflowers feasting on sunshine during the golden days of Indian summer know that none of their gestures express thankfulness.

Their celestial food is too heartily given, too heartily taken to leave room for thanks.

The pines were evidently accepting the benefactions of the storm in the same whole-souled manner; and when I looked down among the budding hazels, and still lower to the young violets and fern-tufts on the rocks, I noticed the same divine methods of giving and taking, and the same exquisite adaptations of what seems an outbreak of violent and uncontrollable force to the purposes of beautiful and delicate life.
Calms like sleep come upon landscapes, just as they do on people and trees, and storms awaken them in the same way.

In the dry midsummer of the lower portion of the range the withered hills and valleys seem to lie as empty and expressionless as dead shells on a shore.