152 
LETTEES FKOM ALABAMA, 
Crimson Cypress-vine {Ipomcea Quamodit^ whose 
flowers, shaped like those of the sister species, are 
of the richest carmine, and whose leaves are cut, 
even to the mid-rib, into a multitude of long and 
slender fingers ; our own Sweet-brier, the Trumpet 
Honeysuckle [Gaprifolium sempervirens) ^ whose 
deep scarlet tubes are the twilight resort of the 
sounding-winged Hawkmoths : 
« — and luxuriant above all 
The Jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets, 
The deep dark green of whose unvarnish’d leaf 
Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more, 
The bright profusion of her scatter’d stars.” * 
These, with other favourite plants, cover the rough 
logs and shingles with so dense a mass of vegeta- 
tion and inflorescence, as effectually hide them 
from view. When the air within the house is close 
and sultry, almost to suffocation, and the unmerci- 
ful rays of the sun, without, glare upon the head 
beyond endurance, it is a pleasant relief to sit in 
these halls beneath the shade, where too there is a 
current of air whenever there is a breath stirring. 
Here the southern planter loves to sit, or to lie 
stretched at full length ; and here, particularly at 
the approach of evening, when the sunbeams 
twinkle obliquely through the transparent foliage, 
and the cool breeze comes loaded with the fragrance 
of a thousand flowers, the family may usually be 
seen, each (ladies as well as gentlemen) in that 
very elegant position in which an American delights 
to sit, the chair poised upon the two hind feet, or 
leaning back against the wall, at an angle of 45^, 
the feet upon the highest bar, the knees near the 
chin, the head pressing against the wall, so as now 
* Cowper’s Task, book vi. 
