Music of the Wild 



Botanists and farmers may know the flower; 

 do others? And does some one ask Avhat it has to 

 do with music? I am coming to that. Early in 

 the season, when the smooth gray-green stems are 

 pulsing with sap, when the tender yellow-green 

 leaves are just unsheathing and not over an inch 

 in length, the papaw lilies blow. I never heard 

 any one else call them lilies, but I will persist in 

 it; they are lilies, and most exquisite ones. The 

 flowers hang lily fashion, their petals are tliick, of 

 velvety lily texture, and look at their formation! 

 Those outside are beautifully veined and curled, of 

 the loveliest wine-red; the inside smaller, slightly 

 lighter in color, and set across the meeting of the 

 outer ones, and a yellow-green pistil, pollen dusted 

 in the heart. 



I can say almost positively that Japan does not 

 produce this tree. If she did, long ago her artists 

 would have seized upon its magnificent possibili- 

 ties for decoration. The height of simplicity so 

 loved by them can be found in the smooth stems, 

 the long, tender golden leaves, and the tinkling 

 wine-colored lilies nodding in clusters over bushes 

 so large that, where undisturbed in the forest, they 

 attain tlie size of trees. Sometimes the flowers 

 hang singly, sometimes in pairs, and most often 

 from foin- to six grow in a head, so that by crowd- 

 ing their faces are upturned, and their full beauty 

 displayed in wondrous fashion. They are of sweet 



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