18 AMONG THE WILD-FLOWERS 



Then the song of a single hermit-thrush immB' 

 diately after did even more for the ear than the 

 lily did for the eye. Presently the swamp- 

 sparrow, one of the rarest of the sparrows, was 

 seen and heard; and that nest there in a small 

 bough a few feet over the water proves to be 

 hers — in appearance, a ground bird's nest in 

 a bough, with the same four speckled eggs. 

 As we come in sight of the lilies, where they 

 cover the water at the outlet of the lake, a 

 brisk gust of wind, as if it had been waiting 

 to surprise us, sweeps down and causes every 

 leaf to leap from the water and show its pink 

 under side. Was it a fluttering of hundreds of 

 wings, or the clapping of a multitude of hands'? 

 But there rocked the lilies with their golden 

 hearts open to the sun, and their tender white 

 petals as fresh as crystals of snow. What a 

 queenly flower indeed, the type of unsullied 

 purity and sweetness ! Its root, like a black, 

 corrugated, ugly reptile, clinging to the slime, 

 but its flower in purity and whiteness like a 

 star. There is something very pretty in the 

 closed bud making its way up through the 

 water to meet the sun, and there is something 

 touching in the flower closing itself up again 

 after its brief career, and slowly burying itself 

 beneath the dark wave. One almost fancies a 

 sad, regretful look in it as the stem draws it 

 downward to mature its seed on the sunless 

 bottom. The pond lily is a flower of the 

 morning; it closes a little after noon, but after 

 you have plucked it and carried it home, it still 



