140 EVERYDAY ADVENTURES 



congregation nodding and swaying in long rows 

 around the vast trunks of white pines which were 

 old trees when this country was born. 



From that day I became a hunter of orchids and a 

 haunter of far-away forests and lonely marshlands 

 and unvisited hill-tops and mountain-sides. Wher- 

 ever the lovely hid-folk dwell, there go I. They are 

 strange flowers, these orchids. When first they were 

 made out of sunshine, mist, and dew, every color 

 was granted them save one. They may wear snow- 

 white, rose-red, pearl and gold, green and white, 

 purple and gold, ivory and rose, yellow, gold and 

 brown, every shade of crimson and pink. Only the 

 blues are denied them. 



Since that first great day I have found the moccasin 

 flower in many places — on the top of bare hills and 

 in. the black-lands of northern Canada, where, four 

 feet under the peat, the ice never melts even in mid- 

 summer. Once I saw it by a sphagnum bog where I 

 was hunting for the almost unknown nest of the Ten- 

 nessee warbler, amid clouds of black flies and mos- 

 quitoes that stung like fire. Again, on the tip-top of 

 Mount Pocono in Pennsylvania, I had just found the 

 long-sought nest of a chestnut-sided warbler. Even 

 as I admired the male bird, with his white cheeks 

 and golden head and chestnut-streaked sides, and 

 the four eggs like flecked pink pearls, my eye caught 

 a sight which brought me to my knees regardless for 

 a moment of nest, eggs, birds, and all. Among rose- 

 hearted twin-flowers and wild lilies of the valley and 

 snowy dwarf cornels swung three moccasin flowers 



