Botanical Excursion to the Mountains of North Carolina, 37 



the night. We re-ascended the summit the next morning, and 

 devoted several hom-s to its examination, but the threatening 

 state of the weather prevented us from visiting the adjacent 

 ridges, or the southern and eastern faces of the mountain, and 

 we were constrained to descend towards evening to the humble 

 dwelling of our guide, which we reached before the impending 

 storm commenced. 



Olu' next excursion was to the Roan Moimiain, a portion of 

 the elevated range which forms the boundary between North 

 Carolina and Tennessee, distant nearly thirty miles southwest 

 from our quarters at the foot of Grandfather by the most direct 

 path, but at least sixty by the nearest carriage road. We trav- 

 elled for the most part on foot, loading the horses with our port- 

 folios, paper, and some necessary luggage, crossed the Hanging- 

 rock Mountain to Elk Creek, and thence over a steep ridge to 

 Cranberry Forge, on the sources of Doe River, where we passed 

 the night. On our way, we cut down a Service-tree^ (as the 

 Amelanchier Canadensis is here called,) and feasted upon the 

 ripe fruit, which throughout this region is highly, and indeed 

 justly prized, being sweet with a very agreeable flavor ; while 

 in the Northern States, so far as our experience goes, this fruit, 

 even if it may be said to be edible, is not worth eating. As ' Sar- 

 vices^ are here greedily sought after, and are generally procured 

 by cutting down the trees, the latter are becoming scarce in the 

 vicinity of the ' plantations,' as the mountain settlements are uni- 

 versally called. Along the streams we met with the mountain 

 species of Andromeda [Leucothoe,) doubtless Pursh's A. axillaris ; 

 but whether the original A. axillaris of the Hortus Keioensis 

 pertains to this, or to the species of the low country, I cannot at 

 this moment ascertain. A portion of Pursh's character seems 

 also to belong to the low country rather than the mountain spe- 

 cies, and the two are by no means clearly distinguished in sub- 

 sequent works. The leaves, in our specimens, are oblong-lan- 

 ceolate, finely acuminate, the margins closely beset throughout 

 with spinulose-setaceous teeth ; and the rather loose spicate ra- 

 cemes, (the corolla having fallen,) are nearly half the length of 

 the leaves. 



Hitherto we had searched in vain for the Astilbe decandra ; 

 but we first met with this very interesting plant in the rich and 

 moist mountain woods between Elk Creek and Cranberry Forgej 



