The Seniors of the Forest 269 



In July pine-roots give a home and a main- 

 tenance to some curious parasitic plants " pine- 

 drops," "pine-sap," and "Indian-pipe," or "ghost- 

 flower." In latter summer the only bits of color 

 on the ground are fungi, white, yellow, orange, 

 and red, which come pushing through the mat of 

 fallen pine-needles on which they live and feed. 



There are few bees in the evergreen woods, and 

 fewer butterflies. The birds seen in the shadowy 

 aisles are the little warblers, which converse in low 

 trills and twitterings. The joyous ringing bird- 

 strains will be heard in copse or swale, in orchard, 

 or meadow, not in the far withdrawing vistas which 

 lead between these pillared trunks to deeper solitudes. 



The brooding silence of the evergreen woods is 

 broken only by the occasional chatter of a squirrel, 

 by wind passing through the boughs with a sound 

 like the wash of waves on far-off shingle, and, per- 

 haps, by the tremulous whistle of the pine-linnet, 

 or the bell-like notes of the hermit-thrush. 



Here and there, under the trees, are those 

 cousins of the ferns which look so confusingly like 

 evergreens that they have received the names of 

 " ground-pine " and " trailing-hemlock." 



They are fitting companions to the pine-trees, 

 for both represent the vegetable life of the elder 



