274 



snakes"* About that period its growing reputation as a 

 watering place drew thitlier those who sought to inaugurate 

 a better state of things. The phmting of trees commenced, 

 the White Willow and the Balm of Gilead were the pioneers, 

 as alone able to flourish under the withering ocean winds, 

 and under their shadow other aad tenderer kinds were nour- 

 ished, till to-day there is a pleasant progress toward the old 

 woodland Ijcauty that garnished the shores Allien Thorwald 

 stood thero in 1004 and exclaimed " Here it is beautiful." 



Whether produced by means of this early destruction of 

 the woods, or otherwise, there are certain points in the Na- 

 hant flora that are very singular. . The most salient of these 

 is the total absence of Ericaceous plants. Perhaps others 

 are better informed in this tlian I, but I liave sought dili- 

 gently o^'er the peninsula for a Blueberry or Huckleberry 

 bush, a Laml)kill, a swamp Pink or a Clethra, and have never 

 found either. In ether places the damp lands that furnish 

 Alders, Wild Roses and June Berries, are also full of that 

 cheat of the berry-boy, the Privet Andromeda, l)ut there is 

 none of it here, though its companions are reasonably com- 

 mon. Neither in the bushy spots about the Calf Spring or 

 skirting the meadow behind Whitney's Hotel, can I discover 

 a solitary Pyrola or Princes Pine, be it never so degenerate. 

 This however is less strange, for the long absence of shading 

 woods would tend to the extirpation of all such smallar forms. 

 But that not a solitary Huckleberry or Andromeda should 

 be here, seems all the more remarkable when we reflect that 

 it cannot be that exposure to the ocean winds has destroyed 

 them. Until within a short period a hillock above the tide 

 range in the midst of the Lynn marshes: has borne a thrifty 

 clump of Huckleberry bushes ; and I well remember that 

 some twenty five years since, such large quantities of berries 

 were picked on one of the islands in Boston Harbor as to at- 

 tract attention in the papers. The sea then is no way inim- 

 ical to this family of plants ; and their entire absence from 

 Nahant (if I am right) is due to some obscure cause, which 

 is 3^et to be elucidated. 



If we visit this island, (for such it may be called) in May, 

 another peculiar production is at once manifest. The Field 

 duckweed is not, perhaps, a rare plant in more northern 

 districts, but appears decidedly such in the regions of Boston. 



* Hist. Lynn, p. 265. t lb. p. 40. 



