WILD PASTURES 



the alder swamp are decorations on the 

 road to the realm of the witch-hazel, 

 where all sorts of strange things may 

 come to pass. 



The ferns and the witch-hazel are 

 themselves mysterious and promoters of 

 mystery, and it is hard to tell which 

 leads in waywardness and subornation 

 of sorcery. The ferns are the lingering 

 representatives of an elder world, a 

 world that was old before the first pine 

 dropped its cones or the leaves of the 

 first deciduous tree fell on the first 

 greensward. Their ways are not the 

 ways of modern plant life. 



Take the cinnamon fern, for instance, 

 one of the commonest of our woods. It 

 grows up each spring like a tender and 

 succulent herb, to wither and die down 

 in the fall as the grass does. But take 

 a spade into the woods with you and try 



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