250 



NATURE FOR ITS OWN SAKE 



spectrum. And again, under the morning sun, 

 with the wind blowing over them, I have seen 

 them glitter and throw light from their polished 

 surfaces like the bayonets of a regiment on pa- 

 rade. And still again in mid-winter I have seen 

 these same commonplace flags standing yellow 

 as gold above the snows, with every stem cast- 

 ing a bright blue shadow, and the whole scene 

 of marsh, sky, and snow showing a perfect col- 

 or-harmony in yellow, blue, and white. 



Indeed, there are many beauties that adorn 

 these marshes unseen by the man who wades 

 across them shod with rubber boots and carry- 

 ing a gun in his hand. There is something 

 quite as beautiful as wild fowl to be seen from 

 the sunken " blind " on the point of land. 

 The play of light on the flat mud near the 

 water, the scarlet sky reflection on the little 

 waves, the amethystine hue made by a flaw of 

 wind rippling the surface of the bay, the splen- 

 dor of the sky, the radiance of the white clouds, 

 are all incomparably fine. Looking backward, 

 the rushes of the marsh extend for miles in one 

 great sweep of color, till they meet the woods, 

 and beyond and above the dark woodland mass 

 stretches another sweep of deep blue sky. There 

 never was a simpler or a nobler landscape. 



