Cypress Swamps 101 
his desolating influence. In that swamp it 
was forbidding because he was not there— 
could not be there—because it was adapted 
alone to the reptilian mind. Of course, the 
Earth of the Carboniferous Age was in reality 
far different and would be more nearly re- 
presented by conditions in southern Florida. 
Yet, if a thinking man could have had a 
glimpse of it then, it would have given him 
some such impressions as does this now and 
would have seemed only more alien and in- 
hospitable to his needs and less adapted to 
anything so highly organised as himself, 
a place for cold-blooded, small-brained, few- 
nerved creatures whose life should be a dull 
sleep. The reptile which inhabits this gloomy 
region is in fact a survivor of a bygone age. 
He no more belongs to this period than do we 
to that primitive past which he has somehow 
survived. Serpent, alligator, and turtle are 
aliens to this biological day and the swamps 
and jungles are the reservations to which 
they are now confined. It is with them as 
it is with the American Indian, as it is with all 
primitive races: they have had their day and 
slowly but surely are passing from view. 
Deciduous, like the tamarack, the cypress 
was putting out its leaves and was arrayed in 
