2 i8 IN SUMMER. 



vives the past, and more perhaps to have many 

 that add a charm to the present, for the pastures 

 in August would be somewhat dreary, I think, 

 were there not in almost every passing breeze the 

 odor of sweet-smelling herbs. 



But if pennyroyal, sweet cicely, and the spicy 

 " mocker "-nut carry me back some twoscore 

 years, what shall be said of a faint odor that can 

 yet be distilled from plants that flourished in the 

 same pastures or where these pastures now are, 

 perhaps a million years ago ? One is not given 

 to thinking of anthracite as at one time wood, 

 but it is different in this instance, for the black- 

 ened, fern-like plants in the underlying clays are 

 still wood and not petrified ; so that they burn 

 with a feeble flame when dry, and burning throw 

 off a rich fragrance akin to frankincense. I have 

 often placed a splinter of these ancient trees in 

 the flame of a candle, and, sniffing the odor that 

 arises, travel in fancy to New Jersey's upland 

 and meadows before they were trodden by pa- 

 laeolithic man ; before even the mastodon and 

 gigantic beaver had appeared ; when enormous 

 lizards and a few strange birds ruled the wide 

 wastes. But the world here was not wholly- 

 strange, even then, for many a familiar tree was 

 growing in this old river valley, as the delicate 

 impressions of their leaves in the clay so clearly 

 demonstrate. 



