Music of the Wild 



■wintered the eocooii.s, and had the rarest moth of 

 our country emerge l)eside my pillow, and sent by 

 tlie liundred the eggs of mated 2)airs to scientific 

 men N\ho lacked ])ersonal experience with the spe- 

 cies. I am not missing anything, and what I get 

 is the palpitant l)eauty and ])ulsing song of exist- 

 ence. The ha])py, cai-e-fi-ee method is to go to the 

 forest in early s])ring, and with senses alive to 

 everytJiing and deliberately follow the changes of 

 tlie seascjn. 



One of the first sights to attract the attention 

 A\ill ])roclaim itself from afar: the flowering of the 

 The Ex- dogMood. Sometimes there is a real tree in imdis- 

 cuseof turbed forest, lifting to the hght a white head that 

 makes a point of splendor. The bloom is a pecul- 

 iar tiling, resembling ])oinsettia in that the showy 

 spatlies, commonly called flo-wers, are merely a dec- 

 oration surrounding the true ])loom, which is small 

 and insignificant. In reality what appears to be 

 white flower ])eta]s are just •wrapping that all win- 

 ter has screened the little flower bud from frost 

 and storm, and tlie small dent in the toj) of each 

 leaf is where the ^ery tip blighted in severe weather. 

 After a Avonderful s])riiig exhibition the dogwood 

 ceases to attract attention and resembles its sur- 

 roundings until fall. Then its leaves begin to 

 color early and outdo almost all others in vivid 

 tints, added to A\'hich are the ripened berries of 

 bright Chinese-red. DogA\'Ood is not rare, and 



56 



