VALLEYS, PLAINS, AND LOWLANDS 



251 



These marshes, whether seen in the summer, 

 when they are so luxuriant in their greens, with 

 the flag in blossom and the young cat-tails 

 nodding in the breeze, or in the fall, when 

 nature is dying and the reeds are day by day 

 shifting through green to gold, when the trees 

 are gorgeous with autumn tints and the orange 

 stain of the short grass is gathering and grow- 

 ing and weaving itself into a brilliant carpet 

 whose colors do not fade until after snow falls 

 seen, indeed, at any time of the year, they are 

 far from being the pestilent congregation of 

 vapors and malaria which fancy usually pict- 

 ures them. Even those marshes that lie close 

 to cities and have ramshackle factories scattered 

 over them, like the Hackensack meadows 

 marshes that are damp with mists and fogs and 

 thick with smoke and dust even these have 

 their charm of color, broken light, and atmos- 

 phere. In picturesque qualities they are almost 

 as fine as the dunes and meadows of Holland. 



In abbreviated proportions the same lowlands 

 line the shores of almost every large river, par- 

 ticularly the rivers with broad basins. The 

 rushes, reeds, and wild rice grow there even 

 better than by the sea. Along the Mississippi 

 the low, flat spaces on either side of the river, 



