102 East and West 
the most delicate garment of green imaginable. 
No tree could renew itself more completely 
than this which had looked so old, squatting 
dismally on the yellow water with its knees 
drawn up—a gnarled, deformed, aged body. 
On the borders of the great swamp, a 
later and happier day in the evolution of 
the earth has dawned. Here the land has 
emerged from the waters and cypress and gum 
give way to the pines of the high ground, and 
to minor and less gloomy swamps which edge 
the clearing and the cotton fields. In these 
swampy places lives the Carolina wren, a 
bright and joyous spirit, whose ringing melodi- 
ous voice would lighten the gloom of the 
nether world. Tea Kettle! Tea Ketile! Tea 
Kettle! he calls and then his song rings in the 
swamp like the cry of a valkyrie. Here too is 
heard the fine spring song of the redwings, 
and sometimes the saunterer may detect a 
wierd and mysterious sound gurgling in the 
air and shall know it for the jacksnipe. 
Creeks meander among the hummocks and 
these were at this season literally choked with 
herring which, with the shad, come up from 
the sea to spawn. 
In this neutral zone, where cotton fields 
touch the edge of the swamps, where jasmine 
