MINOR PRODUCTS OF THE MOUNTAINS 



By Anna Ross 



T? AR up in the heights of the Blue Ridge Hes a wonder- 

 land a land of mountain peak and deep valley, for- 

 est and stream and cataract, mist and cloud and light and 

 shadow the fairest "that e'er the sun shone on." The 

 poet, the artist, the botanist and the nature lover find 

 happy hunting-grounds in the delectable hills and the 

 summer time brings its throngs of visitors, some of them 

 gay pleasure-seekers but many more in search of rest 

 and quiet and the life-giving atmosphere of these high 

 altitudes. 



The mountaineer is busy at this time in the kitchen, 

 the laundry, the livery stable or garage. But September 

 sees the crowd depart and the mountaineer comes into 



BED OF G.'^LAX LEAVES IN JUNE 



Note the thick luxuriant growth and flowers in the shape of 

 white spikes. 



his own again. He has time to pick up the chestnuts 

 that are falling from the trees, and when October comes 

 with its soft haze and its magical, witching atmosphere, 

 then he or mostly she sallies forth in search of the 

 Galax leaf which grows in great abundance in these 

 high altitudes and is much in demand by northern florists. 



It is a beautiful, glossy green, about three inches in 

 diameter. It seems to love the society of the graceful 

 laurel and the stately rhododendron. It has other charm- 

 ing neighbors which display their beauty in the spring 

 time the dogwood with its lovely white blossom and 

 the azalea with its bright yellow or orange flowers, and 

 not far away are oaks, chestnuts and hickory trees, 

 sourwood, sassafras and the tulip, generally known as the 

 pojjlar. 



But Mrs. Mountaineer does not always glean in such 

 pleasant places as she goes "galackin." She scrambles 



up and down rocky cliflfs, over old logs and fallen trees, 

 across creeks and through thickets of rhododendron, in 

 search of her harvest. An expert picker will gather from 

 eight to ten thousand leaves per day, for which she gets 

 twenty to twenty-five cents per thousand. At night they 

 are bunched, twenty-five in a bunch, and tied with a 

 stout string. Frequently whole families go to a distant 

 Galax ground and camp for a week or more in little 

 shacks made of boards, picking leaves during the day 

 and bunching them at night, to the accompaniment, per- 

 haps, of the banjo or guitar, which has been brought 

 along. 



The leaves are taken to a local dealer who packs 

 them between layers of damp moss in wooden boxes. 

 They are then loaded on a wagon drawn by a pair of 

 horses or mules and carried twenty miles or more down 

 the mountain. If night overtakes them the driver halts 

 in a wide space in the turnpike, builds a fire, produces 

 his frying-pan and cofifee pot and some provisions and 

 after the inner man is refreshed the outer man lays him 

 down to sleep in the wagon for the night. Arriving at 

 the railway station, the leaves are shipped to wholesale 

 dealers in the north to be distributed to various points 



NATIVE CHERRY OR BL.ACK BIRCH FOREST 



The owner of the oil still stands with his hand on the tree in 

 a jungle of rhododendron, kalmia, hemlock and chestnut oak. 



