146 WAKE —ROBIN 
than in any other. Here the boys go, too, troops 
of them, of a Sunday, to bathe and prowl around, 
and indulge the semi-barbarous instincts that still 
lurk within them. Life, in all its forms, is most | 
abundant near water. The rank vegetation nurtures | 
the insects, and the insects draw the birds. The | 
first week in March, on some southern slope where 
the sunshine lies warm and long, I usually find the | 
hepatica in bloom, though with scarcely an inch of | 
stalk. In the spring runs, the skunk cabbage pushes 
its pike up through the mould, the flower appearing 
first, as if Nature had made a mistake. 
It is not till about the 1st of April that many 
wild flowers may be looked for. By this time the 
hepatica, anemone, saxifrage, arbutus, houstonia, 
and bloodroot may be counted on. A week later, 
the claytonia or spring beauty, water-cress, violets, 
a low buttercup, vetch, corydalis, and potentilla 
appear. These comprise most of the April flowers, 
and may be found in great profusion in the Rock 
Creek and Piny Branch region. 
In each little valley or spring run, some one spe-, 
cies predominates. I know invariably where to look 
for the first liverwort, and where the largest and 
finest may be found. On a dry, gravelly, half- 
wooded hill-slope the bird’s-foot violet grows in 
great abundance, and is sparse in neighboring dis-. 
tricts. This flower, which I never saw in the’ 
North, is the most beautiful and showy of all the 
violets, and calls forth rapturous applause from all . 
persons who visit the woods. It grows in little 
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