242 THE CAROLINA MOUNTAINS 
row that there Is not room for both road and river, 
and the two, for some distance, become one, the river 
by this time having grown shallow enough to make 
such a liberty possible. This often happens in the 
mountains, and a stranger, seeing you slowly van- 
ishing up a river with no apparent exit, might con- 
clude that you had lost, not only your way but your 
senses. And you do feel a little as though you had 
taken leave of the ordinary ways of life and entered 
into a sort of enchanted world as you splash along 
through a tunnel roofed by tree-tops and paved with 
flashing water, the leafy walls embroidered with the 
strong, dark lines and white flower clusters of the 
Rhododendron maximum. 
These roadways in the rivers, these entrancing 
halls paved with silver, and walled with chryso- 
prase, topaz, and emerald, are among the most cher- 
ished memories of the mountains. There is such a 
road — let us see — in the "Plumtree Country," 
where, in the springtime, the silver-floored tunnel is 
roofed with the delicate colors of coming leaves, and 
out of which you pass into a world radiant with plum 
blossoms, and where the road, no longer paved with 
silver, is bright red and overhung with blossoming 
trees. Clouds of airy white flowers float above you 
and about you, pouring intoxicating fragrance into 
the air you breathe, — and what is more inebriating 
than the breath of the wild plum ! Later in the sea- 
son bright red plums replace the flowers, giving 
forth a spicy and joyous odor that tempts you to 
taste again and again the sparkling juices. The road 
