124 NORTH CAROLINA 



feet, and the latter he missed at Highlands, 

 although, as he says, the presence of trees 

 hung with usnea lichens made their absence 

 a surprise. 



Hardly less rememberable than these dif- 

 ferences of experience was one striking co- 

 incidence. On the 25th of May, when I 

 had been at Highlands more than a fort- 

 night, I was sitting on the veranda waiting 

 for the dinner-bell, and reading the praises of 

 " free silver " in a Georgia newspaper, when 

 I jumped to my feet at the whistle of a Bal- 

 timore oriole. I started at once in pursuit, 

 and presently came up with the fellow, a 

 resplendent old male, in a patch of shrub- 

 bery bordering the hotel grounds. I kept as 

 near him as I could (in Massachusetts he 

 would scarcely have drawn a second look), 

 and even followed him across the street into 

 a neighbor's yard. He was the only one I 

 had seen (he was piping again the next 

 morning, the last of my stay), and on refer- 

 ring to Mr. Brewster's paper I found that he 

 too met with one bird here, l and in exactly 



1 " At Highlands I saw a single male. an unusually 

 brilliant one, which I was told was the only bird of the 

 kind in the vicinity." 



