A Window in Arcady 
In such places, these October days, we find the climbing 
bittersweet in abundance. This characteristic American 
vine, which dearly loves to climb a tree, is shyness itself 
in spring and summer; its flowers are so unassuming that 
they are rarely ever observed, and its foliage is of so con¬ 
ventional a pattern that it passes equally unnoticed in the 
general green livery of the wayside. But suddenly in 
the fall it flames upon our startled sight with showy 
bunches of orange-colored berries, which after a hard frost 
burst open and glow yet more ardently because of the fiery 
red-coated seeds which are within. Bittersweet berries 
retain their brightness indoors for months, particularly if 
gathered unopened before the frost touches them, and are 
among the most cherished of decorations in some rural 
homes. The vine is a famous contortionist, and often 
twists and doubles upon itself to a remarkable degree. 
To-day I gathered a spray of it that had tied itself into a 
loose knot. 
Common along the fence rows is a shrubby relative of 
the elm, the sugarberry, which, like Corp, the friend of 
Sentimental Tommy, has a pronounced tendency to warts. 
These knotty protuberances, which often stud the leaves 
so thickly as to be an actual deformity of the foliage, are,' 
like oak galls, due to the egg deposits of insects. The 
sugarberry shrubs are easily detected in the lanes at this 
season of falling leaves by the numerous reddish-brown 
berries set solitarily upon the twigs, where they remain 
throughout the winter if the birds do not eat them— 
crusty little beads by no means distasteful to human 
palates, too, owing to the presence of a sweetish pulp be- 
[106] 
