Part 9

I rode to the end of the car line, near which I turned off into a thicket, and over a bridge above the milldam. On either hand broad fields of marsh-land stretched out to meet the low, rolling hills. To the right, a path led up the slopes of a cow-pasture, along a little stream to West Rock. The damp hillside was carpeted with Innocence or Bluets (_Houstonia cærulea_), and numerous colonies of violets; and amid the moss-grown hillocks, in the woods, the Dog’s-Tooth Lily (_Erythronium Americanum_) nodded its yellow bell. This lily, so long designated Dog’s-Tooth Violet, is a plant having a broad continental range,—found from Nova Scotia to Florida, and from Maine to Arkansas. In the South it blooms in March, in the North in May. It grows not only in the low coast hills and valleys, but is known to thrive at an altitude of 5500 feet in Virginia and in the North.

The leaves of Dog’s-Tooth Lily resemble a species of Orchis known to Dioscorides as _Satyrion Erythronium_, from which Linnæus in 1753 coined the present generic name _Erythronium_, signifying “red,” for the genus of Dog’s-Tooth Lilies. Wherever the appended term of “Violet” originated for these lilies is not known. According to Frederick H. Blodgett: “In one of the old botanies in the library of the Agricultural Department (Washington), there is a colored plate, illustrating the European species with the name _Viola dens-canis_, with pen notes, giving the later and more modern names also.”[39] That the plant was always considered a lily, however, instead of a violet is evident.

[Illustration:

“_White, innocent twigs of apple, idly swaying,_ _Shed a suave fragrance on the flattered breeze._”

JOHN S. VAN CLEVE.]

Dr. Rembert Dodoens, as early as 1578, thus described it: “This low base herbe, hath, for the most part but two leaves, speckled with great red spots, betwixt which springeth up a little tender stalke or stem with one floure at the top hanging downeward, which hath certaine small leaves growing together like an arch or haute, and like the wild lily.” (The _Amarillis_ of the Spaniards.) “The names of this herbe now are called _Denticulus canis_ and _Dens caninus_, and others call it _Satyrion Erythronium_, wherewithall notwithstanding it has no similitude.”[40] It was known to Dioscorides as _Lilium sylvestre_, and Dodoens remarks that “It may well be called such,” since the flower, when “it hangs downeward toward the grounde, is much like the wild lilies, saving it is smaller.”[41]

Dioscorides (23-77 A.D.) knew this plant as _Ephemeron non lethale_, which was also known in Latin as _Lilium sylvestre_.

Dodoens therefore wrote that if Dog’s-Tooth be _Ephemeron_, as it seemed to be, the essence extracted from its root by boiling water, according to Dioscorides, was good for the teeth. But the name was more likely suggested by the fact that the bulbous root is shaped like a canine tooth. The appended “violet” originated, perhaps, with children, since this lily blooms in early springtime with violets, bluets, marsh marigolds, and arbutus.

The names of all plants among the early Greeks and Romans originated from the shapes of the flowers, leaves, or roots, and also from their medicinal properties. Dioscorides knew another species which he designated _Satyrion Erythronium_ or _Dioscorides Satyrion_, signifying Red Satyrion,—known to the ancient Syrians. Satyrion was the ancient “shop” name for species of Orchis.

Without doubt our generic name for Dog’s-Tooth (_Erythronium_) is a corruption from the Red-spotted Satyrion, whose leaves became confused with _Lilium sylvestre_. Burroughs has remarked that bulbs of lilies in general lie near the surface of the ground. The bulbs of _Erythronium_ are often found at a depth of eight inches or more in the earth, however, according to the age of the lily. The young plant often produces but one leaf, and its bulb is loosely attached to the moss on the surface, while the older plants produce two leaves, their bulbs each season sinking deeper into the soil.

Many common names have been suggested by botanists to replace the seemingly inappropriate name of Dog’s-Tooth Violet. While the appended Violet is misapplied, as we observe, the name Dog’s-Tooth is of ancient origin, and really has more appropriateness than does the generic name _Erythronium_, since none of our species produce red flowers. The name Dog’s-Tooth, therefore, was purposely dropped in the _Illustrated Flora_ of Northeastern North America, and the name Yellow Adder’s-Tongue substituted for the species. There is also an Adder’s-Tongue Fern (_Ophioglossum vulgatum_). We therefore see that the re-establishing of the former and ancient name, Dog’s-Tooth Lily, for species of _Erythronium_ is to be preferred, not only according to the moral rule of priority, but because it is actually the legal common name.

The Westville Swamps were sparkling with these yellow lily-bells, while in the woods along the sluggish stream, the Marsh Marigolds—often called American Cowslips—were holding up their golden goblets to be filled with morning dew. Farther up the stream, near a rude plank bridge in the pasture roadway, I found a baby turtle basking in the sunshine. He was no larger than the hollow of my palm. The little fellow was too frightened to tumble off his stony couch and run for the stream. He sat still and eyed me distrustfully. He drew in his head and toes, and I lifted him gently in my hand, placing him in a paper bag among the flowers I had gathered. I intended him for a surprise in the school aquarium.

Climbing far up the side of West Rock, I looked over the Woodbridge fields and toward West Peak, near Meriden. In the dim distance the Giant’s form was outlined against the horizon at Mount Carmel. This mountain assumes the form of a gigantic Egyptian mummy. The hands are folded across the breast, and the head and feet are stretched in stiff dignity—so to remain through the ages.

Among the wooded hills and vales below, the cloud-shadows chased each other to the distant mountains far beyond. That pile of granite upon the brow of West Rock, designated in history as Judge’s Cave, stood guard over the hills about me. Farther off, toward Westville, many a roof glistened and peered out among the newly leaved trees of the hillsides. One of them was that of Ik Marvel’s home, where perchance he had smoked the dream pipes of his _Bachelor’s Revery_. Smoke now curled above the chimney-tops, full of the drowsiness of May mornings.

The song of thrushes and orioles amid the bushes burst joyously upon me, and during the interludes I heard the hum of bees and the distant murmurings of streams. Butterflies sailed by, flashing their brilliant colors in the sunlight, and the air was laden with the delicate fragrance of early woodlands. It was a day marked by hope and promise. Who can forget those fields of spring where forget-me-nots and violets bloom?

During the afternoon of this glorious day, I journeyed to Mount Carmel beyond Lake Whitney. The old canal from Northampton to New Haven formerly passed along this valley, and although the channel is partly filled in, the towpath still remains, and is well-trodden. I followed it from the end of the car-line, until I reached an elevated ledge of rock to the right. This little hill, clothed with white cedars and junipers, lies beneath the stern brow of the Giant, whose face is plainly outlined against the sky far above the village.

After exploring the ridge hereabout, and finding it covered with Columbine in bud, I descended to the hollow, along the stream. In the rocky crevices at the farthest end of the hill, where the midday sun poured down upon the colony, I found the Columbine flowers in full bloom. I pushed my hand beneath the matted soil, and the plant with roots entire loosened and was easily lifted. Poison Ivy grew about over the rocks, warning me to be cautious. I discovered the Dutchman’s Breeches (_Bicuculla Cucullaria_), but they were faded and nearly fallen. I observed here near the Columbine also another species of the genus not often seen in this locality. It is known commonly as the Bleeding-Heart (_Bicuculla eximia_), formerly designated generically as _Fumaria_. It grows in rocky places, especially in southern New York. I collected it once about Montclair, New Jersey, along the Orange Mountains, and on the borders of Bronx Park, New York City, and in the vicinity of Mount Vernon. This species belongs more especially southward, extending to Georgia and Tennessee, flowering from May until September. There are about fourteen species of this genus found in North America and Western Asia. Three of this number are reported for the Atlantic Region of North America. The third species is known as Squirrel-Corn (_Bicuculla Canadensis_), and is very similar to the Dutchman’s Breeches, save that the plant is smaller.

While waiting for the car at Lake Whitney Junction, on my return to New Haven, I opened the iron gate and wandered along the wooded edges of the shore. I soon distinguished that homely weed of our old dooryard walls and tin-can waste-heaps—the Cat-Mint or Catnip. I gathered some tender shoots for pussy Yale. The name _Catnip_ is of ancient origin, derived from the Latin, _Nepete_, the name of an Etrurian city. Our native plant is of European origin. Dodoens, in 1578, writes of this plant: “In shops it is called _Nepita_; in England _Pep_, and _Cat-Mint_, in French _Herbe de Chat_.” The name of our single species is to-day _Nepeta Cataria_. There are about one hundred and fifty native species of this group of plants found in Europe and Asia.

This family of Mints was known to the ancients as _Calamint_ or _Calamintha_, and included in Dodoens’ day four or five species described by the Greeks, each of them having several names marked by different medicinal virtues. The first kind was called Mountain Calamint; the second was known as Wild Pennyroyal, and the third variety as Cat’s-Mint or Cat’s-Herbe,—just described as _Nepeta_. The Wild Pennyroyal of the ancients resembled the cultivated species at that time also, which was known in England, during 1500, as Podding-Grasse or Pudding-Grass. Pliny attributed twenty-five medicinal and mystical properties to Pennyroyal, in Christ’s day, while Dodoens and Lyte mention fourteen uses of the herb in 1578. Xenocrates prescribed “a branch of Penny-Royall wrapped in wool,” and placed beneath the bedclothes as a remedy against malignant fevers.

The Mints in general were called in ancient apothecary shops _Mentha_. This group of plants was known to Theophrastus, and named _Mentha_, from a nymph fabled in classical literature as having been changed into this plant by the jealous Proserpine.

Yale was delighted with the _Herbe de Chat_, and scented spring and the cat’s heal-all indeed in these tender sprays, rolling and purring over the leaves like a tiger, until at last, soothed, he fell a-napping.

The next morning, May 2d, I started for the Berkshire Highlands, where I arrived in the afternoon. I remained on Aurora’s Hill in North Adams about a week. I was too early for orchid flowers, and the arbutus was still in bloom. These were the real arbutus days here, in spite of their breaking the record now and then by blooming in February. I soon left the slopes of North Adams for Pownal Hills. I found them bleak and cold, and that here, too, I was ahead of all species of the Orchid Family.

I made several excursions to the heart of Rattlesnake Swamp and Rattlesnake Ledge, between May 7th and 15th, searching for Trailing Arbutus. I courted the Swamp of Oracles and the Glen of Comus, watching the buds unfold. The woods were bare and leafless, the paths and dry-brook beds were flooded with sunshine. There is a desolate expression to these deep swamps in early spring, before the tender green leaves of trees and budding flowers burst forth. The birds, however, are here, and their song tells us that it is spring instead of the Indian summer of late autumn. These awakening days of the sleeping woodlands reminded one of the death of the flowers in November. Equally sad is the birth and death of the flowers. The sod steams with the warm southern sunlight pouring upon it until, behold, a week later the green, luxuriant foliage hides all the rocky paths in dense shades, and sprinkles dainty stars and clinging vines over all the ruins of the autumn’s faded stalks and leaves. May holds greater charm and more silent mysteries than the overflowing joy of full-grown June.

I wandered on through the winding paths, finding them draped with mosses and Goldthread blossoms and Painted Trillium. I continued daily to search the woods through and through for the first sight of the Pink Moccasin-Flower. I found three species of _Cypripedium_ on May 15th, and was a little curious to observe how the race would end in their unfolding. There were the rare Ram’s-Head, the Pink and the Large Yellow Moccasin-Flowers in bud. The Pink Cypripedium was the first to open, upon the 19th, while on the same day also the Large Yellow Moccasin-Flower burst into bloom, dropping its long, twisting side petals gracefully beside the stump of a hemlock tree fallen across Ball Brook. The Ram’s-Head, which is supposed to be the earliest _Cypripedium_ to bloom, was not so fortunate. Venturing where it stood among the Amidon Pines one sunny morning, I found the bud still sheathed in the tender green bract-like leaf, laid low and withering upon the ground beside the ruined stem. I picked it up and wondered what or who could have brought about this tragedy. The bract, containing the bud, appeared cut from the stem as with a keen-edged knife. As I held it, I observed a large worm concealed within the plicate folds of the bracted leaf, amid the musky sweetness of the bud. It was round and emerald green, and unlike most worms was possessed of a great degree of spryness; for before my senses were astir, it had dropped to the ground, wriggling out of sight among the leaves and earth at my feet. I poked about, hoping to follow its trail, but to no avail.

[Illustration: =The Woodman’s Road through Rattlesnake Swamp, Mount Œta, Pownal, Vermont.=

“_These dim-aisled forests His cathedrals, where_ _The pale nun Silence tiptoes, velvet-shod,_ _And Prayer kneels with tireless, parted lids._”

ELLA HIGGINSON.]

That this rare _Cypripedium_ has a vile destroyer in this worm, is evident. I felt that I should like to know more about the worm’s life, and why it seeks the rarest species of _Cypripedium_ in North America to feast upon. Perhaps this may account for this flower’s rarity in Pownal, as well as throughout its continental range. I have observed the worm among the Ram’s-Heads in Amidon’s Pines during the past two seasons.

The budded plants of this species in Witch Hollow were also blasted in embryo this season. The two buds observed turned brown and withered on the stem, while yet very tiny, leaving the bract perfectly intact. Some plants, however, were untouched by the destroying worm. They were without doubt too young to bloom, as it requires four or five seasons before seedling Cypripediums produce perfect blossoms in their native haunts.

The seeds of orchids are minute, mostly “spindle shaped,” are found in great numbers, and resemble fine saw-dust. The ovules of the Orchid Family mature slowly, and as far as scientific observations count, in the tests made with the cultivated species, it is said the seeds are a year in coming to maturity. These fertile seeds need several months in which to germinate, requiring, as will be seen, some years to produce seedlings old enough to blossom from the self-sowing capsules of our wild native orchids. Furthermore, a certain temperature and continuous moisture are absolutely necessary to produce seedlings. Our variable Northern climate is one of the natural causes of hindrance to the production of native seedlings of this sensitive family. Continuous moisture does not prevail long enough to promote perfect germination of the thousands of seeds annually produced. They die in embryo from lack of moisture during dry seasons; or if developed, are frozen out in the ice-capped swamps by our long, harsh winters; or in the tender seasons of their seedling-hood the following years, are dwarfed and die from drought. This, in part, is the explanation of the lack of natural seedlings in our native orchid haunts. Adding to this the destructiveness of man, the beasts of the fields, worms, and storms, and the tardiness of insects in fertilization, a hard struggle lies in the perpetuation of the family’s future generations.

Orchids are spoken of as the “weeds of the tropics”; notwithstanding their devastation by the present orchid craze,—which far outstrips the tulip mania in Holland two hundred and fifty years ago,—in regions where continuous heat and moisture prevail, germination of their fertile seeds is rapid and natural.

XI

May Showers and White Moccasin-Flowers

If a man walk in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded a loafer; but if he spend his whole day as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making earth bare before her time, he is esteemed an industrious and enterprising citizen.—THOREAU, _Letters_.

There is something charming about an unwearied rain in spring. I chose a day upon which rain was falling to journey through the swamps, observing my orchid buds. The clouds would lift now and then with sudden brightening, although the gentle patter of the rain was constant. The wind scarcely stirred the leaves. Nature was quiet in her weeping, as a heart that has a grievance which it does not care to share with any one. The meadows grew green, the buds expanded, and the heart of May began to pulsate and sing new songs.

I started out to visit the Glen of Comus, but found the underbrush too laden with rain. I then decided to go through the fields and seek the Chalk Pond colonies. Over the hills lowered a heavy fog, which, as the rain slackened, would for a time lift again, showing the blue peaks in the distance. I turned westward from the glen, through Amidon’s Pines. I had soon passed beyond the limits of this sheltering wood, making a gradual ascent through the raspberry pastures of John-Fallow.

The higher I climbed the harder it poured. However, I arrived among the low white birch saplings and berry bushes. Here I managed to shake the rain off them, becoming as bedraggled as though I had waded in a stream. My umbrella began to leak, and my cap and hair were being soaked, the water actually running down my face. Entering the deeper underwood of birches, I aroused a flock of sheep and their lambs. They ran bleating after me, asking for salt. A mother followed me closely, stamped the earth with her tiny feet, showing her petulance and fear; although she did not turn and run from me as I ventured nearer, but rubbed her nose against my hand.

I now began descending the western slopes of John-Fallow, and was in sight of the woods closing about Witch Hollow. Upon entering the thicket, I soon found my colonies of _Orchis spectabilis_, which were not yet unfolded, although it was May 20th. The Cypripediums had come in far ahead of them this season.

The group of Ram’s-Head also disappointed me, the buds having been blasted in embryo. The plants, however, looked healthy and promising.

Chilled through as I was on my way out of the woods, I thought of stopping at the nearest house on Butternut Lane for a drink of hot milk. I refrained, however, because of my fog-covered garments and the curiosity I might arouse in the neighborhood. Onward I trudged another mile or two, up through the pastures, across the old Welch Farm, following the grass-grown road that originally led from Mount Œta to the valley of the Hoosac, during Revolutionary days.

I had been out about four hours, and it was time I sought shelter, since I had waded through the tall grasses and bushes, regardless of the rain upon their leaves. Once in the house, I realized the comfort of possessing warm, dry garments.

On May 23d I made a journey to Rattlesnake Swamp. Arbutus was still in blossom near the hemlocks,—late clusters, indeed, hiding in the moss at the feet of small spruces, where the ice and snow had lingered latest.

The children in District Fourteen delight in surprising me with strange flowers. Among these I frequently find rare species of plants to name and identify for them. A delicate spray of the Purple-Flowered Clematis was brought to me recently. This vine is rare hereabout, growing only in rocky woods about the Rabbit Plain, and along the Gulf Road of Witch Hollow.

Children in the country districts are the first nature students in spring. In May and June the woods and fields become veritable classrooms in which Nature alone presides as instructor. A dense oak and pine forest formerly sheltered the vale near the schoolhouse, where the children seldom dared to wander without their teacher. The wood was dark and full of the twilight shades of the virgin forest trees of our New England hills.

In May, many seasons ago, the Purple-Flowered Clematis (_Atragene Americana_) grew abundant in the heart of this rocky wood, covering, in one instance, a bush six feet high with its graceful vine. This plant is rare from Maine to Minnesota. It ranges northward to Hudson Bay, and southward to Virginia, often ascending great heights. It is reported in the Catskills at an altitude of three thousand feet. There are but three species of this genus found natively in the North Temperate Zone, one being reported for the Rocky Mountain region, the other farther to the northwest coast of America. The common Virgin’s-Bower (_Clematis Virginiana_) grows also in rocky places, covering roadside walls and bordering swamps and river banks in July and August.

Later in the autumn, this species is very attractive. The seed-pods burst and produce a light, feathery down—little wings to aid the seeds in their flight, like those of the dandelion and milkweed. The seed-capsules of the Purple-Flowered Clematis also produce tails like the plumes of a feather.

Several species of _Clematis_ were known to the ancients in Christ’s day. The name originated with Dioscorides, and was used to designate all climbing vines. He knew three kinds under the generic name of _Aristolochia_, named in honor of Aristotle. The “branched vine” with “deepe violet floures,” was called _Aristolochia clematites_. Peter Bellon of ye olden time remarks that this plant grew in the mountains of Ida in Crete, or Candie. Carolus Clusius reported it as growing among the bushes and briars about the city of Hispalis, or Civill, in Spain, before the sixteenth century.

I visited Oak Hill Cemetery on May 29th,—a very good place to observe the early flowers of the woods about the valley. The country folk come here with their laurels for Decoration Day, as Milton came to his “Lycidas,” “to empurple all the ground with vernal flowers.”[42] Here may be seen the pink azalea, the marsh marigolds—those golden-cups of _Caltha_,—violets, and painted trilliums amid the bunches of pink and golden moccasin-flowers, brought here in abundance by the school children.

On June 5th I sought the swamps of Etchowog. I followed down through the Glen of Comus, in search of the great colony of Pink Moccasin-Flowers. I found them in full bud,—two hundred in number, as formerly. As I entered the hollow, I found in the middle of the path a Small Round-Leaved Orchis (_Habenaria Hookeriana_).

This region is being slowly despoiled of its stately pines. I saw fresh scars of the axe among them. Three first-growth trees were laid low, piled on the side of the road.