16 AMONG THE WILD-FLOWERS 



star, and easily takes the first place among 

 lilies; and the expeditions to her haunts, and 

 the gathering her where she rocks upon the 

 dark secluded waters of some pool or lakelet, 

 are the crown and summit of the floral expedi- 

 tions of summer. It .is the expedition about 

 which more things gather than almost any 

 other: you want your boat, you want your 

 lunch, you want your friend or friends with 

 you. You are going to put in the greater part 

 of the day; you are going to picnic in the 

 woods, and indulge in a "green thought in a 

 green shade." When my friend and I go for 

 pond lilies, we have to traverse a distance of 

 three miles with our boat in a wagon. The 

 road is what is called a "back road," and leads 

 through woods most of the way. Black Pond, 

 where the lilies grow, lies about one hundred 

 feet higher than the Hudson, from which it is 

 separated by a range of rather bold wooded 

 heights, one of which might well be called 

 Mount Hymettus, for I have found a great deal 

 of wild honey in the forest that covers it. The 

 stream which flows out of the pond takes a 

 northward course for two or three miles, till it 

 finds an opening through the rocky hills, when 

 it makes rapidly for the Hudson. Its career 

 all the way from the lake is a series of alter- 

 nating pools and cascades. Now a long, deep, 

 level stretch, where the perch and the bass and 

 the pickerel lurk, and where the willow-herb 

 and the royal osmunda fern line the shores; 

 then a sudden leap of eight, ten, or fifteen 



