I 

 78 THE PLAXT WORLD. 



occurs near the extreme borders, where many roads lead north- 

 ward from O'lSTeil's pastures, beneath the rocky bluffs of Hogs- 

 back range. Here the Great White Trillium blooms in profu- 

 sion, while Violets and Clintonia vie with the Marsh Marigolds ; 

 and amid the twilight shades of cedar and hemlock the Large 

 Yellow Moccasin-Flower {Gypripedium hirsutum), rears her 

 dainty golden shoes amid the ferns. One must look hard in 

 these glooms in order to behold the dull purple blossoms of the 

 shy Ram's-Head Cypripedium, at the feet of scrubby cedars. 

 Everywhere hummocks of moss, interlaced with Snowberry, pile 

 over decaying stumps and logs, between which dark pools reflect 

 the clinging vines, and twin-blossoms of the delicate rose-purple 

 Linnae. The mosses were fairly spangled with these blossoms 

 of light — a vision worth tramping many weary miles to behold. 

 It is in such twilight solitudes in company with the Snowberry 

 and Linnae that the dainty goddess Calypso chooses to dwell. 



The deep solitudes of this spot are chamied, as it were, 

 by utter stillness. The calmness produces a feeling of awe, 

 rather than of peace. I had been warned that the most familiar 

 sons of Bristol had lost themselves almost in hearing of their 

 cow-yards, and waded needless miles through tangled brush 

 heaps and logs. A restless confusion came over me when I 

 was not able to discover the sun. When one becomes interested 

 in some new or unknown plant, and wanders about forgetful of 

 his bearings, he is likely to come out at the place whence he 

 started much mystified. 



On the summits one may easily discover his way, but it 

 is a great risk to enter a large cedar swamp without a compass ; 

 however, I was nearer the open pasture than I knew. ISTature 

 had reared a veritable fortress of hemlock and cedar, and had 

 banked out the light by a dense growth of low, creeping junipers 

 about the edges of her Elysium. 



Blindly I penetrated the thicket of barbed junipers, fright- 

 ening up the Golden-crowned Pheasant. This large, wild fowl 

 has been imported from England by Dr. Seward Webb, and is 

 becoming naturalized successfully in the cedar marshlands of 



