172 



NATURE FOR ITS OWN SAKE 



generally bright and clear, and not unlike the 

 Catskill stream. Indeed, I am not so patriotic 

 that I would arrogate all purity to my own 

 country. I have described the Catskill brook 

 only because it is typical of the river on its 

 Mountain Track. Fortunately there are many 

 streams like it on the face of the globe. 



The source of a stream is often the cause of 

 some disappointment to the finder of it. Some- 

 times it fulfils expectation, and is a small basin 

 of bubbling water rising from beneath a huge 

 rock. Its overflow forms the rivulet that finally 

 develops into the brook. The water in such a 

 case usually comes from a subterranean spring 

 and flows cold and clear, following some vein or 

 fissure in the rock. In Scotland the source is 

 usually a " well-eye," as in Switzerland a glaci- 

 er ; but in America the beginning of the stream 

 is not always so simple or so poetic. Many 

 of the brooks when traced to their origin are 

 found to come from small lakes fed by subter- 

 ranean springs, or more often from a weedy, 

 rush-grown marsh, which acts as a catch-basin 

 for many small surface drainings. The haunt of 

 the coot and the frog is hardly the ideal birth- 

 place of the clear, tossing brook, yet a great 

 many streams come from just such sedgy pools. 



