Songs of the Fields 



Long farm. This season, when a study of them 

 was wanted in their prime, the cameras were loaded, 

 and the trip made in all confidence not a lily was 

 to be found, nor the ghost of a lily. Even more, 

 the embankment next the woods was cut away at 

 least a foot in depth, and leveled. Then began a 

 search all over my country for a large bed of them, 

 with no results. A week had not helped matters, 

 when my critic came from a drive and announced 

 that beside the railroad, half way to Bryant, was 

 a superb growth of lilies that, she thought, was 

 just what I wanted. She brought one for a sam- 

 ple, and she was not mistaken. 



So great was the fear that flower hunters might 

 gather them or railroad employees mow the land 

 that the trip was made in the rain. A glance 

 showed what had happened. The railroad com- 

 pany had cut down the embankment beside the 

 Long farm and filled in a low place near the Lim- 

 berlost crossing with the earth. In so doing they 

 had transplanted my lilies, and greatly to the ad- 

 vantage of the flowers; for here they were in a 

 moist location, and were shaded all the long, hot 

 afternoons. As a result these lilies prove that they 

 grew in closer clusters, taller, and with blooms 

 very nearly twice the size of the average wild lily. 

 After the studies were secured and the flowers 

 were needed no longer, they peeped at me from 

 several fence corners around the Limberlost, Can- 

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