104 Notice of some Plants of Lynnfield, Danvers, 



to, and after having qiiaifed ad lihitimi of some delicious wa- 

 ter from a contiguous spring. These sterner wants being 

 duly regarded, the entire party adjourned to the ample sit- 

 ting room of mine host, where various subjects pertaining to 

 the adventures of the day were discussed in an instructive 

 and suggestive manner. On our return towards Salem, after 

 an hour or two thus spent together, several of our friends 

 proceeded to visit a very large bowlder of much interest, fa- 

 miliarly known as Ship Rock, lying at a very considerable 

 height in the rear of the house of David Newhall, on the 

 Lynnfield Road, and about a mile distant from Tapley's 

 Brook. It is estimated that this huge fragment weighs about 

 eleven hundred tons ; and yet, from the scratches and fur- 

 rows beneath it, and from the grooves made upon the rock 

 itself on which it lies, resting upon its apex, it is conjectured 

 that it must have been an erratic. Other bowlders, that are 

 estimated to weigh from fifty to seventy-five tons, are scat- 

 tered around in the area ; while this rears itself above them 

 all in massive solidity and grandeur. From the top of this 

 pebble stone, of twenty-two feet altitude, and standing 

 as it does, on the brow of a considerable ascent, the view is 

 one of much beauty, showing beneath your eye the thriving 

 town of Danvers, stretching out in many a village, marked 

 by its white spires, and Salem and its pleasant harbor, and its 

 wooded shores. To rescue this noble specimen of some for- 

 mer mighty cataclysm, from any contingency of being broken 

 up and quarried, the Essex Institute made itself possessor of 

 it by purchase ; and to give facility to its inspection, a safe 

 and light apparatus of iron was attached, by which the top 

 can be easily reached. 



Having, some years previous, collected specimens of Dra- 

 ba verna on a spot not far from this place, through the atten- 

 tion of my friend. Dr. Nichols, the original discoverer of this 

 habitat of this very small and very early flower, I directed my 

 steps thither in quest of Bartr'amia fontana, which also occurs 

 in the same locality. My companions, as well as myself, 

 found some difficulty in detecting it, so perfectly desiccated 

 was the entire surface of the ground over which, in early 



