AUGUST. 193 



the purest whiteness, looking timidly out from their 

 bower of ferns, hedged around by tall reeds, and pro- 

 tected by a canopy of alders, they seem the apt emblems 

 of innocence and vestal purity. 



It is now almost impossible for the rambler to pene- 

 trate some of his old accustomed paths in the lowlands, 

 so thickly are they interwoven with vines and trailing 

 herbs. Several species of cleavers, with their slender 

 prickly branches, form a close network among the 

 rushes and ferns ; and the smilax and the blackberry 

 vines weave an almost impenetrable thicket in our 

 ancient pathway. The walls are festooned with the 

 blue flowers of the woody nightshade, and the more 

 graceful plants of the peavine and groundnut are twin- 

 ing among the faded flowers of elders and viburnums. 

 The bending panicles of the blue vervain are nodding 

 above the yellow flowers of the tufted loosestrife, and 

 the purple downy spircea decks the borders of the fields 

 with its numerous pyramidal clusters. The lowlands 

 were never more delightful than at the present time ; 

 and they afford one many' a refreshing arbor beneath 

 the shrubbery, where the waters have dried away, and 

 left the green grass plat as sweetly scented' as a bower 

 of honeysuckles. These are places that seem designed 

 for our refreshment on summer noondays : bowers 

 where it is delightful to repose beneath the shade of the 

 slender birches whose tremulous foliage seems to be 

 whispering to us some pleasant messages of peace. 

 All around us the convolvulus has woven its delicate- 

 vines, and hung out its pink and striped bellflowers ; 

 and the clematis, or virgin's bower, has formed an um- 

 brageous trellis-work over the tops of the trees. Its 

 white clustering blossoms spread themselves out in 

 triumph over the clambering grape vines ; and wood- 

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