CONCLUSION 185 



It is truly lamentable to think how quickly some 

 of our rarest flowering plants are becoming 

 exterminated, owing to the thoughtless to use 

 no stronger term and lavish way in which they 

 are gathered and uprooted ; and it is quite pos- 

 sible, if care and self-restraint are not exercised 

 in time, that a similar fate may some day be 

 in store for our more uncommon mosses and 

 liverworts. One cannot help fearing that those 

 botanists who come after us, and who read our 

 published records of localities once the haunts of 

 plants of especial interest, but whose botanical 

 wealth will then be exhausted, will not have any 

 very kindly feelings for our extravagant and spend- 

 thrift ways, and our slight concern for future 

 nature-lovers, whose delight in such things will 

 be as great as, and perhaps greater than, our own. 

 Let me close with one more quotation from the 

 poet on whose words I have more than once drawn. 

 They will, I hope, sum up the spirit of the story 

 which I have had to tell. 



If thou art worn and hard beset 



With sorrows that thou wouldst forget, 



If thou wouldst learn a lesson that will keep 



Thy heart from fainting, and thy soul from sleep, 



Go to the woods and hills ! No tears 



Dim the sweet look that Nature wears. 



(LONGFELLOW, " Sunrise on the Hills.") 



