TIIE LADIES’ FLORAL CABINET. 
325 
from. Near neighbors to the Cowslips were the Sagit- 
tarias, with stalks of white, yellow-centered flowers and 
queer lanceolated leaves. Deeper in were Partridge 
vines, with their berries of coral; great tangles of Gold 
Thread, with their fragile blossoms; two-leaved Solo¬ 
mon’s Seal; snowy white Cohosh on stems of red pipe- 
stone ; tall, queenly Cattails and Ferns of every name; 
polypod Ferns of shining green, beached Ferns, sensi¬ 
tive Ferns, gigantic cinnamon Ferns, the Goliahs of their 
kind, and the superb Osmunda, whose pinnated leaves 
suggest the regal diadem that crowned the stately 
Saxon queen from whom the plant takes its name. 
What loads of treasure we were always bringing 
home from that old swamp ! Armfuls of clematis, for 
one thing ; “ virgin’s bower” we called it then, though 
since we have learned to like the good strong Saxon 
Witliy-wind, as quaint old Evelyn named it. Wood¬ 
bine, too, flaring crimson the late autumn through, and 
quantities of wild grapes and berries. What delicious 
berries they were, picked in the dew and the sunshine, 
when the shadows of the trees fell slanting on the 
green sward ! None have tasted so sweet since. Through 
all the midsummer days bloomed the Daisies, swaying 
on their slim stalks, white, open-faced, sunny, beauti¬ 
ful, on a green “mede,”as fair to the eye as when 
Chaucer sung : 
“ Of all the floures in the mede, 
Love I most these floures of white and rede. 
Such as men call day’s eyes in our town.” 
Between the knolls, in the dryer places, were flower¬ 
ing Sedges and wild grasses. I am quite sure that the 
Melic and the Galingale of Tennyson and Jean Ingelow 
were there ; for what but a wild grass with a honeyed 
name was the “ Melic ” of that meadow, where the high 
tide came in on that fearful night when “ my son’s wife, 
Elizabeth,” walked there calling plaintively : “Cusha ! 
Cusha !” till the waters came ? Galingale, we all know, 
is only a Sedge with flowers like heads of grain. What 
a sight was that level greenness, shining from end to 
end with beautiful color, as the yellow light of sunset 
slanted across it, transforming it into a warm, glowing 
picture that rivalled far anything of Claude Lorraine ! 
Can you not fancy an iEnone under the shadows of 
yon trees, piping for a lost Paris ? Circe could reign 
there, or Calypso hold there an Odysseus in enchant¬ 
ment. In this entrancing spot fairy Ariels and Pea- 
blossoms come to one’s mind, and all the splendid 
richness of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” 
“ The velvet sward seems carpet meet 
For the light fairies lively feet ; 
Yon tufted knoll, with daisies strewn, 
Might make proud Oberon a throne ; 
While, hidden in the thicket nigh, 
Puck should brood o’er l)is frolic sly ; 
And when profuse the wood vetch clings 
Round ash and elm in verdant rings, 
Its pale and azure penciled flower 
Should canopv Titania’s bower.” 
Oh, the woodsy smells of that old swamp ! They 
come to me to-day with the organ of memory, and my 
jaded nerves quicken and thrill as I inhale the steamy 
gush of their frankincense and myrrh. The odor of 
that cool, moist ground, combined with that of pungent 
Pennyroyal and Sassafras and the thuriferous Pines, 
Hemlocks and Cedars, floats in at my window as I 
write, and surrounds me like the cloud with which 
Althene enveloped Diomed. There is tonic in these 
woodsy smells, and no Naiad or water-nymph ever 
sought a refuge with half the zest that we did the cool 
recesses of that beloved swamp. 
Time after time we explored the mysterious recesses 
along the alder-fringed banks of the brooklet. We fished 
in the pools with white butterflies and dragonflies buz¬ 
zing about. We played in the brown shadows and in 
the waves of topaz, when the warm October sunlight 
brightened the opened places. We gathered every flower 
in its season, from the earliest Arbutus and Violet, 
through Buttercups, Lilies, Cardinal Fowers, Medolas, 
to the Witch Hazel flowers that fill the chill November 
air with sweetness. That closed the floral year. The 
tawny gold of the lingering petals is the last tribute of 
Flora. There is nothing more of summer in the meadows 
for us. 
Jack Frost’s icy fingers locked the swamp in glitter¬ 
ing fetters of frost, and softly the snowflakes settled 
down upon the wild expanse. But the white wide waste 
was never dreary to us, but pleasant even then, for un¬ 
derneath the snow we knew that the mosses lay green 
and vivid as of yore, that the Twinberry and the Par¬ 
tridge V ine were still flourishing there, and that the 
roots of Violet and dainty Fern, and* Crocus and Daisy 
were all alive, and would, when the kiss of the sun-god 
aroused the slumbering princess, send up their fresh 
leaves and beautiful blossoms again. F. M. Colby. 
HOW THEY TRIMMED THE CHURCH. 
I spent my summer vacation in a little Connecticut 
village situated in the valley of the river that gives its 
name to the State. Leaving New York at a time when 
most country visitors are turning their faces cityward, 
we had the enjoyments that a New England September 
affords, a month that, perhaps, more than any other 
gives fulfillment of the promises made by those that 
have gone before. All summer nature has been profuse 
with her floral decorations, begun in April with the un- 
matchable trailing Arbutus, and followed by the hun¬ 
dred of other varieties of wild flowers that serve in turn 
to beautify the landscape. But it remains for Septem¬ 
ber to show the greatest profusion of form and color, 
as if to develop all reserved resources before the coming 
of the chilling frosts that October will bring. 
There had been no service in the village church for 
several Sundays—the city custom of closing for a time 
having found its way there. To emphasize its recom¬ 
mencement the young people had gathered from field 
and forest, from hillside and valley, floral treasures 
with which to decorate the edifice. 
The room is rectangular, with a recess at one end, 
wherein is a platform on which stands the preacher’s 
desk, and on either side of the desk is a Corinthian col¬ 
umn. Around these columns were wound in profusion 
long branches or sprays of Clematis or Virgin’s bower, 
C.Virginiana. Thebeautifulwhiteflowersthathavegiv- 
en the plant its common name are succeeded by the long 
feathery tails of the seeds in bunches of greenish white 
that show conspicuously among the glossy green leaves. 
