THE fl/KlERICp BQTpiST. 



Vol. V. BINGHAMTON, N. Y., NOVEMBER, 1903. No. 5. 



GLEANINGS FROM SEA AND MOUNTAIN. ;,^^ ^ 



eoT.4 \' 



BY PAULINE KAUFMAN. ^ 



JULY and part of last August were spent at Avon, N. J. 

 This place was originally a kind of Chautauqua. Art- 

 ists and students of all branches of natural history used 

 to meet there to teach and be taught. The flora, being a 

 sort of connecting link between North and South, proved 

 of great interest, as also did the fauna. Many of the small 

 sea horses {Hippocampus Hudsonius) were at that time 

 taken from the Shark River, but have since disappeared. 

 Some years ago I found in a mound of earth, quite a dis- 

 tance from the river, a great number of what I then took 

 to be dried star-fish, but which may have been earth stars. 

 Though better able at present to identify them, the vari- 

 ous changes in the place prevent my finding their location. 

 Two summers ago these was, between Ocean Grove and 

 Avon, a fine bog filled with the most exquisite flowers. The 

 swamp grass was jeweled -with meadow beauty {Rhexia 

 Virginica), sea pink {Sahhatia stellans), water lillies, 

 yellow-eyed grass (Xyris), milkwort {Polygala sangui- 

 nea), swamp St. John'swort (Elodes) and water lobelia, 

 while great spikes of the white fringed orchis {Habenaria 

 blephariglottis) stood here and there like sentinels. 



With red hair bristling, waiting open-mouthed for 

 their victims were hundreds of the thread-leaved sundews 

 with their spikes of rosy, innocent looking flowers. Near- ■ 

 by among the cranberries the small white-flowered Dro- 

 sera Americana helped along the carnage, and in the veater 

 the yellow helmets of the bladderwort just eluded our 

 grasp. This year the lovely bog was a dried up mud- 

 puddle. But the orchids w^ere more plentiful than ever. 



