"THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET" in 



at a step the boy of more than a century ago passed 

 from one country of romance to another. Up 

 stream lie to-day as they did then the rolling bil- 

 lows of land, fertile fields, wooded hills and the 

 tangle of swamp and thicket that is, I believe, more 

 luxuriant in those parts of Plymouth County 

 where the forest comes down to the sea than in any 

 other place. I have never found, in tropical jungle 

 or the warmer countries of the temperate zone, 

 such matted areas of richly growing shrub and 

 vine as you meet in these Plymouth County bottom 

 lands where the fresh water comes down to meet 

 the salt. Fox grapes luxuriate there and woodbine 

 and convolvulus climb and twine, but the toughest 

 of the tangle is due to the greenbrier, to penetrate 

 which one needs to use a machete as much as ever 

 Cuban did in Camaguay. The greenbrier is tough 

 and its thorns repellent, yet its glossy smilax 

 leaves are beautifully decorative and its close-set 

 bunches of deep blue fruit, now ripe, please the 

 eye if not the palate. Thickets like these border 

 the pasture paths in this rich bottom land walling 

 in the wanderer with high tapestried walls of vivid 

 green, richly patterned with varied leaves and 



