CAPE COD 415 



reputation. The country in which these Cape Cod berries are 

 produced is a most peculiar and interesting one. In fact, it is a 

 surprise to anyone not intimately acquainted with it. 



Let the reader lay before him a map of Massachusetts, and 

 locate Plymouth and Barnstable counties upon its eastern ex- 

 tremity. Upon the south, Buzzard's Bay thrusts itself between 

 the two counties, and all but cuts off the long and low hook which 

 stretches eastward and northward to Cape Cod. In provincial 

 parlance, the Cape Cod region includes all the peninsular part of 

 the state, beginning with the lower and eastward projection of 

 Plymouth county. The cranberry region extends from this 

 eastern part of Plymouth county eastward to the elbow of the 

 peninsula, or, perhaps, even farther. 



Upon one of the upper arms of Buzzard's Bay the reader 

 may locate the old and quaint town of Wareham. Here the tides 

 flow over long marshes bordering the inlet, and rise along the 

 little river which flows lazily in from the Plymouth woods. Here 

 the sea-coast vegetation meets the thickets of alder and bay- 

 berry and sweet fern, with their dashes of wild roses and vibur- 

 nums. And in sheltered ponds the sweet water-lily grows with 

 rushes and pond-weeds in the most delightful abandon. In the 

 warm and sandy glades two kinds of dwarf oak grow in profusion, 

 bearing their multitude of acorns upon bushes scarcely as high 

 as one's head. The dwarf chestnut oak is often laden with its 

 pretty fruits when only two or three feet high, and it is one of 

 the prettiest shrubs in our eastern flora. 



We drive northward over the winding and sandy roads into 

 the town of Carver, where the largest cranberry plantations are 

 located. We are now headed towards Plymouth, and our journey 

 lies in the "Plymouth woods." And here the surprises begin ! 

 Do you look for fields of corn and grass, and snug New England 

 gardens, and quaint old houses whose genealogies run into centu- 

 ries? Yes, you are picturing an old and overworn country, from 

 which the impetuous youths have long ago fled to the new lands 

 of the West. But while we are busy with our expectations, we 

 are plunging into a wilderness! not a second growth, half- 

 civilized forest, but a primitive waste of sand and pitch-pine and 

 oaks I The country has never been cleared, and it is not yet 

 settled! And in its wilder parts deer are still hunted, and 



