The Wilderness 43 
mountaineer, the Adirondacks and Catskills, 
though not insignificant in altitude, are not 
mountains at all as he knows them, corre- 
sponding to his idea of foothills. But a 
wilderness—yes; the Adirondacks are the 
wilderness. 
I went into the North Woods in May, the 
last month of winter, and came out late in 
October, which again is the beginning of win- 
ter. There were flurries of snow until the 
first of June and the aspect was wintry save 
for the appearance towards the end of May 
of the warblers who, arriving somewhat later 
than at lower levels, found the woods still 
inhospitable. But how they enlivened that 
boreal region! Roving bands of chestnut, 
Blackburnian, Magnolia, black-throated 
green, black-throated blue, black-and-white, 
mourning, and bay-breasted warblers darted 
in and out the budding trees, affording little 
gleams of colour—of lemon yellow, orange, 
chestnut, olive, and blue-black against the 
silver grey and reddish purple setting of hem- 
lock trunks and maple twigs. Their faint 
tseeps were the first shy utterance of a still 
uncommunicative earth awakening from its 
strange lethargy of winter. Now and again 
a high-pitched trill, woodsy and aloof, gave 
