Art. II. The Flora of the Adirondacks. By Geo. T. 



Stevens, M.D. 



[Read before the Albany Institute, February, 1868.] 



In the midst of the great state of New York lies the 

 Switzerland of America ; a region where huge mountains 

 elevate their summits against the deep blue sky, and 

 thick forests spread over tens of thousands of acres. 

 Here, between the vast rugged hills whose sides are, even 

 in winter, perpetually green, lie sleeping almost innumer- 

 able lakes, reflecting the green of the hills, like gems in 

 their caskets of unhewn granite. 



Deep gorges and beautiful valleys divide the towering 

 hills, and hundreds of creeks and rivulets wind in crooked 

 channels their ways to the lakes, now gliding silently 

 between the overhanging trees and shrubs, whose deep 

 shade shuts out the sunlight, now tumbling noisily over 

 stony bottoms and anon plunging over the side of some 

 rocky declivity in foaming cataract or laughing cascade, 

 sometimes dissolving into light spray before reaching the 

 far down bottom, and then collecting in crystal streams 

 overhung by long grasses and kissed by bright flowers. 



Here, among the wildnesses of forests and mountains, 

 stalk the red deer and the moose, ranging their pathways 

 from the mountain tops to the lake sides, or cropping the 

 green herbage from glen or marsh. The speckled trout 

 in great numbers disport in the shining waters, of the 

 lakes or timidly shrink under the overhanging banks of the 

 streams. The thrumming of the partridge is heard along 

 the hill sides, and the raven and the eagle are seen wheel- 

 ing in elegant circles above the mountain cliffs. Here, 

 too, the tourist is startled by the piercing screams of the 



