EARLY SPRING IN MASSACHUSETTS. 5 
erally about equidistant from the two banks. 
It is a convenient expression for which I think 
we have no equivalent. 
February 24, 1858. I see rhodora in bloom 
in a pitcher with water andromeda. Went 
through that long swamp northeast of Boaz’s 
Meadow. Interesting and peculiar are the 
clumps and masses of panicled andromeda, with 
light brown stems, topped uniformly with very 
distinct, yellow-brown recent shoots, ten or 
twelve inches long, with minute red buds sleep¬ 
ing close along them. This uniformity in such 
masses gives a pleasing tinge to the swamp’s 
surface. Wholesome colors which wear well. 
I see quite a number of emperor moths’ cocoons 
attached to this shrub, some hung round with 
a loose mass of leaves as big as my two fists. 
What art in the red-eye to make these two 
adjacent maple twigs serve for the rim of its 
pensile basket, inweaving therli ! Surely it 
finds a place for itself in nature, between the 
two twigs of a maple. On the side of the 
meadow moraine, just north of the bowlder 
field, I see barberry bushes three inches in di¬ 
ameter and ten feet high. What a surprising 
color this wood has. It splits and splinters 
very much when I bend it. I cut a cane, and, 
shaving off the outer bark, find it of imperial 
yellow, as if painted, — fit for a Chinese man¬ 
darin. 
