Off to the Hills 5 



monly as Cowslips, were already fading. On the 

 edges of the swamp, the Marsh Buttercups of the Crow- 

 foot Family (^RayiJincidaccce) , were lifting their shallow 

 yellow cups to catch the sunshine. We wandered on 

 through a pretty, wild bit of young woodland until we 

 reached the border of a murmuring stream, creeping 

 onward through the vale and meadow, touching the 

 blossoming orchards here and there, and freshening the 

 sweet white violets on its brink. 



North Adams, Massachusetts, was to be my next 

 station. This city is about two hundred miles from 

 New York, among the Hoosac Highlands. I almost 

 expected to see reluctant snowdrifts still lingering in 

 the fence corners and shaded pine glens of this part of 

 " Beautiful Berkshire," and I half hoped to find a few 

 late clusters of the Trailing Arbutus {Epigiza repe7is) 

 creeping through the cold, mossy ravines. 



Upon my arrival in North Adams, I looked through 

 the bogs under the brow of Hoosac Mountain near 

 Aurora's Lake, and I could perceive scarcely any 

 difference in the progress of flowers or foliage here 

 from that of the region from which I had just de- 

 parted. Dogwood, apple trees, violets, anemones and 

 wake-robins were in blossom, while in the deeper 

 bogland I found one lone, pale Pink Moccasin-Flower 

 {Cypripedium acaulc). 



American White Hellebore, so commonly known as 

 Indian Poke or Itch Weed ( Veratrum viride), had 

 already sent out a luxuriant growth of green leaves, 

 which for a moment deceived me— as it had done many 



