Music of the Wild 



The river is a house, the bed its floor, the sur- 

 face its roof, and all the water-folk its residents. 

 What a wonderful thing it would be if the water 

 were transparent, that we might see the turtles, 

 eels, and catfish busy with the affairs of life; bass, 

 pickerel, and suckers maintaining the laws of su- 

 premacy, and water puppies at play! When the 

 purple tints on its banks fade, tree-bloom baptizes 

 it with golden pollen, and a week later showers 

 it with snowy petals of wild plum, thorne, crab, 

 and haw. All summer the trees drop a loosened 

 leaf here and there, with Good Samaritan results; 

 for these make lifeboats on which luckless wasps, 

 bees, and worms fallen from blooming trees ride 

 to safety and dry their drenched coats and 

 weighted wings. Trees are the great life-saving 

 service of the river, especially in the fall, when the 

 water is covered with crisp, dead leaves. Many of 

 them are needed, for the cool nights chill the in- 

 sects so that they fall easily, the winds blow with 

 unusual violence, and there are three times as many 

 victims drowning as in summer. 



Throughout the season many blooms decorate 

 the river bank, but two stand pre-eminent: the 

 God's redbud borne on a small tree, the mallow on a 

 sm ' u ^' The tree flower is remarkable because it 

 is almost the first color shown, and it breaks all 

 over the branches like a severe attack of measles, 

 when not the hint of a leaf is in sight. These come 

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