27 



air is filled with its fragrance — one of the flowers that conduce to 

 thought, through which 



" Ever the words of the gods resound ; 



But the porches of man's ear 

 Seldom, in this life's low round, 

 Are unsealed, that he may hear." 



The twin-flower is no longer found in Worcester county outside of the 

 few northern towns, so the great beds in Gardner are especially inter- 

 esting. 



As we return on the circuit, at the head of Parker's pond and the 

 junction of Wilder and Kneeland brooks, almost within sound of the 



Near the Kneeland Place. 



busy life of Gardner, we find, by the foot of a tall tree, a faint cellar- 

 hole marking the site of the home of the Kneeland Maids. They were 

 two aged sisters, daughters of Timothy Kneeland, one of the earliest 

 settlers in Gardner, fotind beaten to death in their beds in March, 1855. 

 The buildings were destroyed b\- fire the following May, and a crime 

 that filled the whole state with horror, and caused, to the timid, fear 

 and apprehension for many a long ^-ear thereafter — a crime that was as 

 brutal and cowardly as any in the history of the Commonwealth, went 

 unpunished by man, and after forty years leaves the ashes of a once 

 happy home its onh- reminder. 



Or keep on through East Tenipleton, turning to look at the great 

 ■blossoms on the tulip-tree ( Liriodcndron tiilipifera ) at the corner of the 

 Parkhurst house-lot, and as you climb the long Ladder hill, note an 



