a ec
eee

ebsites

ape ener

 

a
a,
a7

te it ee seated
santas aacs

er
ae

‘

Rhine)

ees
ver mip. &
gore re

rant Be

et
ees
mie

as
fies

 
        

   

 

: I
\J

Cornell University Library
Ithaca, New York

 

BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE

THE BEQUEST OF

WILLARD FISKE

LIBRARIAN OF THE UNIVERSITY 1868-1883
1905
ornell University Libra

Tia
 

 
‘S - dy pee by ; |
Gorka eb prari, (OIE, UB Lecreg A eye
ee OE ee eo a
Cope) ye ere 2b Exypo eriyp xy 00> preva "4D ¢
- CVOPE Lyf wirw-gre Purr’ bog byppo ry be? ;
Jf Pree Prnayrrwarny aor cg by oy ’
¢ (A tievag 1s wy psy) coh ae

Vey — Poe lee Mia VY ERG¥\L 9527716 U4

LPT Lg Heirgev j Z ips Bev Uy ey ’

of Lise E cpgerh A bilpan mpart
ied eg Bed ae

/
PEARLS AND PEBBLES;

OR,

NOTES OF AN OLD NATURALIST.

BY

CATHARINE PARR TRAILL,

AuTuor or “Stupies or Piant Lire,” “Lost in THE Backwoops,” “AFAR

IN THE Forest,” Etc., Erc. ‘

WITH

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH,

By MARY AGNES FITZGIBBON,

a t
AvuTHOR oF “A VETERAN OF 1812,” ‘‘A Trip To Manirosa,” Ertc., Etc.

LONDON: #
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY,
: LIMITED.

TORONTO: WILLIAM BRIGGS.
[ENTERED AT STATIONERS’ HALL.]

PRINTED BY
WILLIAM BRIGGS,
TORONTO, CAN.
CONTENTS.

Introductory Note

Biographical Sketch

Preface . :

Pleasant Days of My Chilahasa .

Sunset and Sunrise on Lake Ontario: a Reratiriveenes! x

Memories of a May Morning
Another May Morning
More About My Feathered F Ruiends

The English Sparrow: a Defence
Notes from My Old Diary . & ks
The Spider é
Prospecting, and What I Found? in ‘My Dieting
The Robin and the Mirror
In the Canadian Woods ‘
The First Death in the Clearing
Alone in the Forest. ‘i ‘

- On the Island of Minnewawa .
The Children of the Forest .
Thoughts on Vegetable Instinct
Some Curious Plants
Some Varieties of Pollen . ; y
The Cranberry Marsh . = 2 a
Our Native Grasses .
Indian Grass
Mosses and Lichens .
The Indian Moss-bag .
Something Gathers Up the F iscernneitt

“ ILLUSTRATIONS.

Portrait of Mrs. Traill

Gun Hill, Southwold Beach
““Reydon Hall” :
“‘Westove,” Residence of Mes. Trail
‘Polly Cow’s Island”

179
. 187
195
. 202
207
212
219
. 224
232
235

Frontispiece
vii

xvi

56

‘ . 182
INTRODUCTORY NOTE,

Mrs. TRAILL’s book was already in the press when
I was requested by the publisher to write a short
biographical sketch of the author's life as an intro-
duction.

Both time and space were limited, and I undertook
the task with much anxiety, knowing that with such
and other limitations I could scarcely expect to do the
subject justice, é

I have endeavored to use Mrs. Traill’s own notes and
extracts from her letters, wherever available, hoping
thus to draw a life-like picture vather than enumerate
the incidents of her life or put the records of the past
into “cold type.”

I have dwelt particularly on the circumstances of Mrs.
Traill’s childhood and youth, which I believe went far
to influence her later life and direct her literary labors,
and because they are also likely to be of greater interest
to the public and the readers of her books than a mere
detailed record of her life.
li INTRODUCTORY NOTE.

When asked some years ago by the editor of the
Young Canadian to write a sketch of Mrs. Traill’s life
for its columns, the rider to the request was added that
she “wished the sketch to be written with a loving
pen—one that would depict the flowers rather than the
thorns that had strewn her path,” and I have in these
few lines kept that kindly wish in view.

If I have failed to satisfy myself or others with my
work, it has not been from lack of love for the honored
and valued authoress of “ PEARLS AND PEBBLES.” |

May we keep her long to bless us with her loving
smile and happy, trustful spirit, and enrich our literature
still further with the products of her graceful pen.

Mary AGNEs FirzGiszon.

Toronto, December 4th, 1894.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

AutHoucnH the family from which Catharine Parr Strickland
(Mrs. Traill) is descended was one of considerable note and
standing in the northern counties of England, her immediate
ancestor was born and spent the greater part of his life in
London.

The cause of the migration of this branch of the Strickland
house was the unexpected return of Catharine’s great-grand-
father’s elder and long-lost brother. He had been hidden at
the Court of the exiled Stuarts, at St. Germains, and returned,
after an absence of upwards of twenty years, to claim the
paternal estate of Finsthwaite Hall and its dependencies. He
not only established his claim, but, with an ungenerous hand,
grasped all the rents and revenues accruing to the property,
and his nephew, then a student at Winchester College, dis-
daining to ask any favors of his uncle, left the now reduced
comforts of Light Hall, his mother’s jointure house, and went
to seek his fortune in the metropolis. Being successful in
the quest, he, after a time, married Elizabeth Cotterell, of
the loyal Staffordshire family of that name, and maternally
descended from one of the honest Penderel brothers, who
protected Charles II. in the oak at Boscobel, and succeeded,
through their intrepid loyalty to the house of Stuart, in
effecting his escape.
1v BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

Of this marriage there were eight’ children: Thomas, born
in 1758; Samuel, in 1760, and two sisters. The remaining
four fell victims to the small-pox, at that date an almost
inevitably fatal disease. :

Thomas, who was Catharine’s father, early obtained employ-
ment with the ship-owners, Messrs. Hallet & Wells, and
through them became master and sole manager of the Green-
land docks, w position which threw him in the way of meeting
many of the great men and explorers of the last century. He
was twice married, first to a grand-niece of Sir Isaac Newton,
and through her he came into possession of a number of books
and other treasures formerly belonging to that celebrated
scientist.' Mrs. Strickland died within a few years of her
marriage, having had only one child, a daughter, who died in
infancy; and in 1793 Mr. Strickland married, as his second
wife, Elizabeth Homer, who was destined to be the mother
of a family of nine, five of whom have made a name in the
literary annals of the century. Elizabeth and Agnes, after-
ward joint authoresses of “The Lives of the Queens of Eng-
land,” and each the writer of other historical biographies,
poetry and other works; Sara and Jane, the latter author of
“Rome, Regal and Republican,”
were born in London, Kent. There, also, on January 9th,
1802, Catharine Parr was born, and though named after the
last queen of Henry VIIT., who' was a Strickland, she has
always spelt her first name with a “C,” and was ever known
in the home circle by the more endearing words “the Katie.”

Mr. Strickland’s health being affected by too close applica-
tion to business, he was advised to retire and take up his
residence in the more bracing climate of the eastern counties.

After living a few months at “The Laurels,” in Thorpe,
near Norwich, he rented “Stowe House,” an old place in the
valley of the Waveney, not far from the town of Bungay.

“The first and happiest days of my life were spent at ‘Stowe
House,’ in that loveliest of lovely valleys the Waveney,” she

and other historical works,
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.
writes ; and truly there is no spot in all England that can
vie with it in pastoral beauty.

The highroad between Norwich and London passes behind
the site of the old house, separated: and hidden from it by the
high, close-cropped hedge and noble, wide-spreading oaks.
The house (pulled down only within the last few years) stood
on the slope of the hill, and below, at the foot of the old
world gardens and meadows, the lovely river winds its silvery
way to the sea. The green hills, the projecting headlands,
the tiny hamlets clustered about the ivy-covered church
towers of fifteenth and sixteenth century architecture; the
beauty of the velvety meadows and the hawthorn hedges ;
the red-tiled cottages with their rose-clad porches, and beyond,
against the sky, the old grey towers and massive walls of that
grand old stronghold, the Castle of Bungay, where the fierce
Earl Marshal of England had defied the might and menace
of the “King of all Cockaynie and all his braverie,” altogether
form a scene it would be difficult to equal in any quarter of
the globe.

Among other rooms in ‘“‘Stowe House,” there was a small
brick-paved parlor, which was given up entirely to the chil-
dren. Here they learned their lessons, waited in their white
dresses for the footman to summon them to the dining-room
for dessert, or played when debarred by unpropitious weather
from the ‘little lane,” so prettily described by Mrs. Traill in
“Pleasant Days of my Childhood.”

Many anecdotes and stories have been told me by the elder
sisters of the hours spent within the oak-panelled walls and
by the great fire-place of the brick parlor, of the pranks and
mischief hatched there against the arbitrary rule of a trusted
servant who hated the “ Lunnon children” in proportion as
she loved the Suffolk-born daughters of the house Here
they learned and acted scenes from Shakespeare, pored over
great leather-bound tomes, of history, such as a folio edition of
Rapin’s “History of England,” with Tyndall’s notes, and

2?
vi BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

printed in last century type.. Here Agnes and Elizabeth
repeated to the younger children Pope’s “Homer’s Iliad,”
learned out of Sir Isaac Newton’s own copy, or told them
stories from the old chronicles.

Mr. Strickland was a disciple of Isaak Walton and a devoted
follower of the “gentle craft,” but being a great sufferer from
the gout, required close attendance. Katie generally accom-
panied him to the river, and though Lockwood, a man-servant
who had been with him many years, was always at hand,
Katie could do much to help her father, and became very
expert in handling his fishing-tackle, while still a very small
child. One of Mrs. Traill’s most treasured possessions now is
a copy of the first edition of “The Compleat Angler,” which
formerly belonged to her father. x

When talking of her childhood, Sara (Mrs. Gwillym) always
spoke of “the Katie” as the idolized pet of the household.
“« She was such a fair, soft blue-eyed little darling, always so
smiling and happy, that we all adored her. She never cried
like other children—indeed we used to say that Katie never
saw a sorrowful day—for if anything went wrong she just
shut her eyes and the tears fell from under the long lashes
and rolled down her cheeks like pearls into her lap. My
father idolized her. From her earliest childhood she always
sat at his right hand, and no matter how irritable or cross he
might be with the others, or from the gout, to which he was
a martyr, he never said a cross word to ‘the Katie.’”

“Stowe House” was only a rented property, and when, in
1808, ‘““Reydon Hall,” near Wangford, fell into the market, Mr.
Strickland bought it and removed his family to the new home
at the end of the year.

“Well do I remember the move to Reydon that bitter
Christmas Eve,” said Mrs. Traill, when speaking of it on last
Thanksgiving Day, her eyes shining as bright as a child’s with
the recollection. ‘The roads were deep in snow, and we chil-
dren were sent over in an open tax-cart with the servants and
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. Vil

carpenters. It was so cold they rolled me up ina velvet
pelisse belonging to Eliza to keep me from freezing, but I was
as merry as acricket all the way, and kept them laughing over
my childish sallies. We stopped at a place called ‘ Deadman’s
Grave’ to have some straw put into the bottom of the cart to
keep us warm. No, I shall never forget that journey to
Reydon through the snow.”

A fine old Elizabethan mansion, of which the title-deed

 

 

GUN HILL, SOUTHWOLD BEACH.

dates back to the reign of Edward VI1., “Reydon Hall” was a
beau ideal residence for the bringing up of a family of such
precious gifts as the Strickland sisters. It stands back from
the road behind some of the finest oaks, chestnuts and ashes
in the county. Built of dark brick, its ivy-covered wall, its
gabled roof, tall chimneys, stone-paved kitchen, secret cham-
bers and haunted garrets suited both their imaginative and
fearless natures. A magnificent sycamore in the centre of
the lawn, a dell at the end of “the plantation” (as a wide
vill BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

open semi-circular belt of oaks was called), and the beautiful |
Reydon Wood to the north, on the Earl of Stradbroke’s
property, formed a grand environment for the development of
their several characteristics.

Mr. Strickland educated his elder daughters himself, and
having a fine library, they were given an education far superior
to that which generally fell to:the lot of the daughters of that
date. He had purchased a house in Norwich, and always
spent some months of the year in that beautiful old cathedral
city, and as the attacks of gout increased in frequency, was
obliged to reside there during the winter. He was generally
accompanied by one or two of his daughters, his wife dividing
her time as much as possible between the two houses. During
her absence from Reydon, the care and education of the younger
children devolved upon their eldest sister Elizabeth.

That the literary bent showed itself early will be seen by
the following account, which I cannot refrain from giving as
much in.Mrs. Traill’s own words as possible : ,

“We passed our days in the lonely old house in sewing,
walking in the lanes, sometimes going to see the sick and
carry food or little comforts to the cottagers; but reading was
our chief resource. We ransacked the library for books, we
dipped into old magazines of the last century, such as Chris-
topher North styles ‘bottled dulness in an ancient bin,’ and-
dull enough much of their contents proved. We tried history,
the drama, voyages and travels, of which latter there was a
huge folio. We even tried ‘Locke on the Human Under-
standing.’ We wanted to be very learned just then, but as
you may imagine, we made small progress in that direction,
and less in the wonderfully embellished old tome, ‘ Descartes’
Philosophy.’ We read Sir Francis Knolles’ ‘History of. the
Turks,’ with its curious wood-cuts and quaint old-style English,
We dipped into old Anthony Horneck’s book of ‘Divine
Morality,’ but it was really too dry. We read Ward’s ‘ His-
tory of the Reformation in Rhyme,’ a book that had been
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. ix

condemned to be burnt by the common hangman. How this
copy had escaped I never learned. I remember how it began :

“««T sing the deeds of good King Harry,
And Ned his son and daughter Mary,
And of a short-lived inter-reign
Of one fair queen hight Lady Jane.’

“We turned to the Astrologer’s Mayazine and ae frightened
the cook and housemaid by reading aloud its horrible tales of
witchcraft and apparitions that they were afraid to go about
after dark lest they should meet the ghost of old Martin, an
eccentric old bachelor brother of a late proprietor of the Hall,
who had lived the last twenty years of his' life secluded in

‘the old garret which still bore his name and was said to be
haunted by his unlaid spirit. This garret was a quaint old
place, closeted round and papered with almanacs bearing
dates in the middle of the past century. We children used
to puzzle over the mystical signs of the Zodiac, and try to
comprehend the wonderful and mysterious predictions printed
on the old yellow paper. There was, too, a tiny iron grate
with thin rusted bars, and the hooks that had held up the
hangings of the forlorn recluse’s bed. On one of the panes
in the dormer windows there was a rhyme written with a
diamond ring, and possibly of his own composition ;

“*<TIn a cottage we will live,
Happy, though of low estate,

Every hour more bliss will bring,
We in goodness shall be great.—-M. E.’

“We knew little of his history but what the old servants told
us. He had never associated with the family when alive. His
brother’s wife made him live in the garret because she disliked
him, and he seldom went abroad. All the noises made by rats
-or the wind in that part of the house were attributed. to
the wanderings of poor Martin. There was also a little old
woman in grey, who was said to ‘walk’ and to play such
x BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

fantastic tricks as were sufficient to turn white the hair of
those she visited in the small hours of the night.

“Had we lived in the days of ‘spiritualism’ we should have
been firm believers in its mysteries. The old Hall with its
desolate garrets, darkened windows, worm-eaten floors, closed-
up staircase and secret recesses might have harbored a legion
of ghosts—and as for rappings, we heard plenty of them. The
maid-servants, who slept on the upper floor, where stood the
huge mangle in its oaken frame (it took the strong arm of the
gardener to turn the crank), declared that it worked by itself,
the great linen rollers being turned without hands unless it
were by those of ghosts. No doubt the restless little woman in
grey had been a notable housewife in her time, and could not
remain idle even after being in her grave for a century or more.

“To relieve the tedium of the dull winter days, Susan and
I formed the brilliant notion of writirig a novel and amusing
ourselves by reading aloud at night what had been written
during the day. But where should we find paper? We had
no pocket-money, and even if we had been amply supplied
there was no place within our reach where we could purchase
the means of carrying out our literary ambitions. Enthusiastic
genius is not easily daunted, and fortune favored us. In the
best room there was a great Indian papier-tnache chest with
massive brass hinges and locks. It had contained the ward-
robe of a young Indian prince who had been sent to England
with an embassy to the Court of one of the Georges. This
chest was large enough to fill the space between the two
windows, and hold the large rosewood and bamboo cot with
its hangings of stiff cream-white brocaded silk embroidered
with bunches of roses, the colors still brilliant and unfaded,
alternating with strips worked in gold and silver thread. The
four curtains of this luxuriant tented cot were looped with
thick green ribbons. There were ancient damasks, silks, old
court dresses that had belonged to some grande dame of
Queen Anne’s reign, and turbans of the finest India muslin
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. Xl

of great length and breadth, yet of so fine a texture that the
- whole width of one could be drawn through a lady’s finger-
ring. My mother had also made the old chest a receptacle
for extra stores of house-linen, and underneath all she had
deposited many reams of paper, blotting-paper, and dozens of
ready-cut quill pens which had been sent to our father on the
death of his brother, who had been a clerk in the Bank of
England. Here was treasure trove. We pounced on the
paper and pens—their being cut adding much to their value—
and from some cakes of Indian ink we contrived to manu-
facture respectable writing fluid. Among the old books in
the library there was a fine atlas in two quarto volumes, full
of maps and abounding in the most interesting geographical
histories of the European countries, legends, the truth of
which we never questioned, and flourishing descriptions that
just suited our romantic ideas of places we had never seen but
had no difficulty in picturing to ourselves. I chose the period
of my herg William Tell, intending to write an interesting
love tale ; but I soon got my hero and heroine into an inextri-
cable muddle, so fell out of love adventures altogether, and
altering my plan ended by writing a juvenile tale, which I
brought to a more satisfactory conclusion. Every day we
wrote a portion, and at night read it aloud to Sara. She
took a lively interest in our stories and gave us her opinion
and advice, of which we took advantage to improve them
the following day. Not feeling quite sure of our mother’s
approval, we kept our manuscripts carefully concealed after her
return, but we were in even greater dread of our eldest sister,
knowing that she would lecture us on the waste of time.
“One morning I was sitting on the step inside our dressing-
room door, reading the last pages of my story to Sara, when
the door behind me opened and a small white hand was quietly
placed on mine and the papers extracted. J looked at Sara
in dismay. Not a word had been spoken, but I knew my
mother’s hand, and the dread of Eliza’s criticism became an
xil, BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

instant reality; and her ‘I think you had been better
employed in improving your grammar and spelling than in
scribbling such trash,’ sounded cruelly sarcastic to my sensi-
tive ears. I, however, begged the restoration of the despised
manuscript, and obtained it under promise to curl my hair
with it.

“T did in truth tear up the first part, but a lingering affec-
tion for that portion of it containing the story of the ‘Swiss
Herd-boy and his Alpine Marmot,’ induced me to preserve it,
and I have the rough copy of that story now in my possession.”

Early in the spring of the following year, May 18th, 1818,
Mr. Strickland died at Norwich. The sudden tidings of the
failure ofa firm in which he had allowed his name to remain
as a sleeping partner or guarantor, and the consequent loss of
the principal. part of his private income, brought on an aggra-
vated attack of the gout, which terminated fatally. Katie
had spent the winter with him and her sisters Eliza and Agnes
in the town house. Mrs. Strickland was at Reydon, but was
to return the following day to prepare for the usual move to
the old Hall for the summer.

Mr. Strickland’s sudden death was a great shock to his
family, and Katie grieved much for him. He had always
been indulgent to her, and his loss was her first sorrow, the
first cloud on her young life. Here I may quote again from
her own notes :

“We had often heard our father express a wish to be
buried in some quiet churchyard beyond the walls of the
city, in the event of his death taking place before his return
to Reydon, and in accordance with that wish he was laid to
rest at Lakenham, a lovely rural spot about two miles from
Norwich. There we three sisters, true mourners, often
resorted during the summer evenings to visit the dear father’s
resting-place, and bring a loving tribute of fresh flowers to
strew upon the grave.”

The house in Norwich was retained, and as the two

\
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xi

brothers were attending Dr. Valpy’s school, the two elder
sisters and Katie remained there. Elizabeth, having been her
father’s amanuensis and confidante, had much to do in con-
nection with business matters. Agnes was not strong, and
requiring frequent change of air, was much away visiting
friends. Katie was thus left very much to herself.

“Thad access to the city library, so that I had no lack
of reading matter, and my needle, varied by a daily walk to
the garden below the city wall, occupied a good deal of my
time. The garden was shut in by a high paling and was quite
private. I spent many hours in this retreat with my books,
and it was at this time that I ventured once more to indulge
the scribbling fever which had been nipped in the bud by
adverse criticism the preceding year. I was a great lover of

_ the picturesque, and used to watch with intense interest the
Highland drovers as they passed to the great Norwich market.
I admired their blue bonnets and the shepherd’s plaids they
wore so gracefully across breast and shoulder, and the rough
coats of the collie dogs that always accompanied them, and
often listened to the wild notes of the bagpipes. Scotland
was the dream of my youth. Its history and poetry had taken
a strong hold on my fancy, and I called the first story I wrote
at this time, ‘The Blind Highland Piper.’ The next was
inspired by a pretty little lad with an earnest face and bright
golden curls peeping from under a ragged cap. He carried a
wooden yoke on his shoulders, from which were suspended
two water-pails. He passed the window so often to and fro
that I grew to watch for him, and give him a little nod and
smile to cheer his labors day by day. I never knew his
history, so I just made one for him myself, and called my
story after him, ‘The Little Water-Carrier.’ Thus I amused
myself until my collection comprised some half-dozen tales.
One day I was longer than usual absent at the city wall
garden gathering red currants, and had unwittingly left my
manuscript on the writing-table. On my return, to my con-
XiV BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

fusion and dismay, I found it had been removed. I could
not summon courage to question my sister about it, so said
nothing of my loss. A few days passed, and I began to fear
it had been burned, but on the next visit of our guardian,
Mr. Morgan, on business connected with my father’s estate,
he said to my eldest sister, ‘Eliza, I did not know that you
had time for story-writing.’

““My sister looked up in surprise and asked him what he
meant. Taking my lost property out of his pocket he replied,
‘I found this manuscript open on the table, and, looking over
its pages, became at once interested and surprised at your
work,’

“Eliza looked inquiringly at me, and though confused and
half frightened, I was obliged to claim the papers as mine.

“Our kind friend then added as he rolled up the manuscript
and replaced it in his pocket, ‘ Well, Katie, I am going to
correct this for you,’ and I, glad to escape without a rebuke
for waste of time or indulging in such idle fancies, thought
no more of my stories. A month afterwards Mr. Morgan,
with a smiling face, put into my hands five golden guineas,
the price paid for my story by Harris the Publisher, in St.
Paul’s Churchyard, London.”

Thus was Mrs. Traill the first of the Strickland sisters to
enter the ranks of literature, as she is now the last survivor
of that talented coterie. The unexpected success of Katie’s
first venture no doubt induced her sisters to send their MSS.
to the publishers. How their work has been recognized is
matter of history.

“The Blind Highland Piper, and Other Tales ” was so well
received by the public that Katie was employed by Harris to
write another for his House. “Nursery Tales” proved a
greater success, although the remuneration she received was
not increased. She next wrote for the Quaker House of
Messrs. Darton & Harvey, ‘Prejudice Reproved,” “The
Young Emigrants,” “Sketches from Nature,” “Sketch Book
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XV

of a Young Naturalist,” and “The Stepbrothers.” This firm
paid her more liberally than Harris, and it was with the
utmost delight and pleasure that she sent the proceeds of her
pen to her mother at Reydon, grateful that she was able to
help even in so small a way to eke out the now reduced
income of the home.

Messrs. Dean & Mundy published “Little Downy, the
Field-mouse,” and “Keepsake Guinea, and Other Stories,” in
1822. Many other short stories were written and published
in the various Annuals issued between that year and Katie’s
marriage in 1832. ‘Little Downy, the Field-mouse” was
the most popular, and is, I believe, still in print. None of
the early works of the sisters were written over their own
names, and a late edition of this story was issued by the
publishers over Susanna’s (Mrs. Moodie) name, and though
both the sisters wrote protesting against the blunder and
requesting a correction, no notice was taken of their letters.

“ Little Downy was a real mouse,” said Mrs. Traill recently,
when speaking of her early works, “and I well remember
how I wrote its story. I used to sit under the great oak tree
near where it lived, and watch the pretty creature’s frisky,
frolicing ways, and write about it on my slate. When I
had both sides covered I ran into the house and transcribed
what I had written in an old copy-book, then ran out again
to watch the gentle dear and write some more.”

During the years which intervened between the death of
her father-and her marriage, nothing of very great moment
occurred in Katie’s life, save the falling in of a small legacy as
her share of a deceased uncle’s property. She made occasional
visits to London, where she stayed with a cousin of her father’s
or with other friends—visits full of interest from the people she
met, the glimpses obtained of fashionable life, and the often
amusing adventures which ever fall to the lot of those who
go about the world with their eyes open. Katie’s, brilliant
complexion, soft beauty and sunny smile won her the love
xvi. ‘BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

and admiration of all with whom she came in contact, and
she was always a welcome guest with old and young alike.

The means at Reydon were narrow, and in those days
poverty was regarded almost as a crime, so they lived quietly
in the old Hall, sufficient society for each other, and each
pursuing the line of study in accordance with the particular
bent of her individual genius.

Susanna had married in 1831, and come with her husband*
to live at Southwold, and it was at their house that Katie
met her future husband. Mr. Thomas Traill belonged to one
of the oldest families in Orkney. He was also a friend and
brother officer of Mr. Moodie’s in the 21st Royal Scotch
Fusiliers, ‘and the two families of Moodie and Traill had
been connected by marriage in more than one generation.
Educated at Baliol College, Oxford, in the same year with
Lockhart, who was an intimate friend, Mr. Traill could
number many of the great. writers and men of the day among
his acquaintances, and knew many anecdotes of Scott, Giffard,
Jeffreys and Wilson. He had married first an Orkney lady,
and her health requiring 4 warmer climate, he had lived
abroad for several years and enjoyed the opportunity of
meeting some of the great men of literature and science at
the courts of Paris and Berlin. He was an excellent linguist
and a well-read man.

At the time of his visit to Southwold his wife had been
dead some years, his two sons were in Orkney with their
mother’s relatives, and he, having no settled plan for the
future, was ready to take a lively interest in the question of
emigration to Canada, the new country at that time being
widely advertised and lectured upon, and in which free grants
of land were being offered as an inducement to retired and
half-pay officers to try. their fortunes in the New World.

 

*John .W. D. Moodie (youngest son of Moodie of Me’setter, Orkney),
late Lieut. 21st Fusiliers, and author of ‘“‘Ten Years in South Africa,”
“‘ A Soldier and Settler,” etc.
“ITVH NOGAGY

 

 

 

 

   

   

tm
pee

 

 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XViL

Katie met him at her sister’s house, and it was not very
long before it became known to the family at Reydon that
Mr. Traill meant to precede the Moodies to Canada—-and
that he was not to go alone.

The grief of the sisters was great at the idea of parting
with the beloved Katie. At first they refused to believe so.
preposterous a tale, but “the Katie” had made her choice
and no entreaties could prevail upon her to change her mind.
They were married on May 13th, 1832, in the parish church
at Reydon, by the vicar, the Reverend H. Birch. It was a
very quiet wedding, and a sad one, for the shadow of the
coming parting was over them all.

“On the 20th of May I bade farewell to my old home and
the beloved mother whom I was never again to see on earth,
and, accompanied by my sisters Agnes and Jane, went down
to the beach, from whence we were to be rowed out to embark
on the City of London, one of the first two steamers which
then plied between the metropolis and Leith.

“Tt was Sunday and a lovely bright morning, the heavens.
cloudlessly blue and the sea without a ripple save that of the
incoming tide; the waves running in in curving lines along
the beach, with a murmuring music all their own. The bells
from the tower df the grand old church of St. Edmund
were chiming their summons to the morning service, but.
they seemed to me to be repeating the sad refrain—

‘¢ «Parting forever,
Parting forever,
Never again to meet !
Never, O never !’

Yet as I leaned over the side of the ship and watched the
boat that conveyed my sisters back: to the shore until it was.
a mere speck upon the ocean, I little dreamed that my eyes
should never again look upon those dear ones and England’s

loved: shores. Hope was ever bright. To me there was always.
Xvill BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

a silver lining to every cloud, and surely it is a gift of God
that it has ever been so, that in the darkest hours of the
sorrows, privations and troubles of after years I could look |
up and say, ‘Thy will be done. ae

After a stay of two or three days in Edinburgh, the Traills
embarked in the old Pomona packet for Kirkwall.

Mrs. Traill was received by her husband’s relations and by
his first wife’s sisters and father with the utmost kindness
and affection, although no one could have appeared in worse
plight to captivate unknown relatives than she did that morn-
ing, wet from the sea spray, weary and weak from the effects of
the stormy passage. One of these sisters, Miss Fotheringham,
is still living in London at the advanced age of ninety-one,
and I have sat beside the beautiful white-haired old lady and
listened with delight to her description of the arrival of the
English bride their brother-in-law bepaght so unexpectedly
to their house at Kirkwall.

“We were not altogether pleased at the tidings of his mar-
riage, but we fell in love with his second wife before she had
been a day in the house; and truly she was a lovely, bright
sunny creature to take out to the untracked wilds of a colony.”

After a stay of some weeks in the Islands, they returned
to Scotland to sail from the Clyde in the last vessel of the
season bound for Quebec and Montreal.

The following word-picture of the parting at Kirkwall is
descriptive of the tenacious affection felt by the tenantry and
dependents for their feudal lairds, who hold rank and titles
peculiar to the islands, and which are derived from their
descent from the Norse Vikings who in former ages so often
defied the power of the Scottish kings :

“Assembled on the Kirkwall pier we found about twenty-
five of the Westove tenantry. They had come down to take
leave of their old master. Among them was auld Jean Scott,
the nurse or moome of my husband. He, wishing to propitiate
her in my favor, had provided me with a handful of coins to
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xix

give her. Though her hand closed over the silver, she con-
tinued to regard me with a stern and forbidding countenance,
—I was a stranger and a foreign body, not one of their
island folk. In wild, impassioned tones she entreated the
master to stay in his ‘ain countrie an’ amang his ain people
and kin.’ Then turning to me she said angrily, ‘ An’ it is ye
that are takin’ him awa’ frae us. Ye are bonnie eneuch, an’
if ye wad but speak the word he maunna deny ye; but ye
wauna, ye wauna dae it,’ and flinging back my hand she
threw herself on her knees at her master’s feet, sobbing out,
‘Ye will gae awa, an’ these e’en that see ye the noo wull see.
ye nae mair.’ g

“My husband lifted and tried to soothe her, but she would’
not be comforted. Ah, Jean! you spoke truly; the master
you so loved and honored lies in the little churchyard on
the banks of the Otonabee, far from the Lady Kirk of his
Orkney Island home.”

At Inverness, Mrs. Traill first saw a Highland regiment
“all plaided and plumed in their tartan array,” and heard the
pipes playing the grand Highland “ March of the Cameron
Men.” Her enthusiasm, as well as her intimate knowledge
of the Scottish writers, won her golden opinions, and the
English bride received much attention from the Highland
descendants of the men who had striven to the death for the
cause of the Stuarts.

“T was far from quite well when we left Inverness by the
little passenger steamer Highland Chieftain, yet not too ill to
find myself, in company with others of the passengers, climb-
ing the steep winding path which led from the waters of Loch
Ness to the Falls of Foyers and plucking many sweet wild-
flowers by the way. My love for flowers attracted the atten-
tion of two of my companions, a Mr. Allen, of Leith, and a
Mr. Sterling, of Glasgow, both of whom I found were horti-
culturists and well acquainted with the flora of the country.
We entered into conversation, and they added much to the
XX BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

pleastire of the journey by pointing out to me the interesting
objects along our route. At Glen Morrison, a fine old gentle-
man with his fishing-basket and tackle was rowed out to
the boat by two barefooted Highland lassies, stout girls who
plied the oars with as powerful a stroke as any of the fisher
lads of Cromarty. I must have eyed the fishing-basket with
a longing glance (it reminded me of my childhood days on the
bank of the Waveney), for the old laird noticed me and we
became quite friendly. He talked of salmon fishing and
Highland lochs, and pointed out the wild opening of Lochiel’s
Glen. Then we spoke of the Camerons and the Macdonells,
the Stewarts and Glencoe, the Highland chiefs and Highland
feuds and emigration, and I told him we were bound for the
far west. Before he left the boat at a point leading to
Inverary, he held my hand a few seconds and said: ‘If you
should ever be near the Highland settlement of Glengarry,
and need help or shelter, say that you have seen the Macdonell,
and every door will be opened to you, every Highland hand
held out in token of friendship.’

“That night we spent in a clean little public-house within
sight of the giant Ben Ness, the hostess of which talked
much of Sir Walter Scott, whom she had known well. The
illness I had felt coming on when in Inverness was only
stayed, and it now overtook me, robbing me of all the
pleasure of the lovely scenery of the Clyde, and by the time
we reached Greenock I was completely prostrated. Skilful
treatment and careful nursing, however, enabled me to
recover sufficiently to be carried on board the brig Laurel, in
which our passage had been taken and paid for, and which it
would have been a serious loss to forfeit.”

Mrs. Traill speaks of this brig as being the last of the
season sailing from that port to Quebec. They sailed on the
7th of July, a fact and date which bear interesting compari-
son with the carrying trade of the present time between the
Clyde and Canada.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xxi

The passage was a good one, unbroken by storms or fogs,
and although very ill during the first part of the voyage, by
the time the Zawrel entered the Gulf Mrs. Traill had quite
recovered her health. The trip up the river was a slow one ;
there was little wind, and they had to depend largely on the
tide for their onward progress, tacking constantly to take
advantage of what breeze there was, and casting anchor
when the tide turned. They were also delayed waiting for 4
pilot, and did not reach Quebec until late on the evening of
August 15th, and on the 17th cast anchor before Montreal.

The Traills went to the Nelson Hotel until they could have
their baggage passed through the Custom house, always a
tedious business, and particularly so at that date. The
weather was intensely hot. Cholera was raging in the city,
and before the two days of delay had expired Mrs. Traill was
stricken down with the terrible disease. She was tenderly
eared for by a woman in the inn, a sister of the proprietor,
to whose fearless devotion, as well as to the skilful treatment
of Dr., Caldwell, she owed her recovery. Worn out by his
untiring efforts among the cholera patients, this devoted
physician fell a victim to the disease about a month later.

Athough narrowly escaping death, the recuperative vitality
which has ever been the characteristic feature of the family,
enabled her to recover quickly, and on the 29th, Mrs. Traill
was sufficiently restored to health to continue her journey by
stage to Lachine, and thence by boat and stage to Prescott,
where they took their passage on board the Great Britain,
then the largest and best steamer on the route.

In the sketch, “Sunset and Sunrise on Lake Ontario,” Mrs.
Traill gives an account of the journey from Brockville to
Cobourg. On September 9th, they left Cobourg in a light
waggon for the shores of Rice Lake, there to take the steamer
for Peterborough, in the neighborhood of which place Mrs.
Traill’s brother, who had emigrated to Canada some years
before, had lately settled.

3
XXIl BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

“A motley ‘group of emigrants shared the only available
room in the log-house which did duty as tavern on the shores
of Rice Lake. The house consisted of but two rooms, the
kitchen and one other apartment or public room. Inacorner,
on a buffalo robe spread on the floor, and wrapped in my
Scotch plaid cloak, I rested my weary limbs. The broad
rays of the full moon, streaming in through the panes of the
small window, revealed our companions of the Cobourg stage,
talking, smoking, or stretched at full length sleeping. Ona
rude couch at the other end of the room lay a poor sick
woman, tossing and turning in a state of feverish unrest,
moaning or muttering her delirious fancies, unconscious of the
surroundings.

“Our early six o’clock breakfast of fried pork, potatoes, and
strong tea without milk, was not very tempting, and it was
but a scant portion of the rade meal that I could take.
Leaving the crowded table, we strolled down to the landing-
place, where a large party of Irish emigrants were encamped.
It was a curious scene. What studies of the picturesque for a
painter were there! Men in all sorts of ragged coats and
brimless hats and huge wrinkled brogues; women with red
handkerchiefs tied over their dishevelled locks, and wearing
jackets that had once done duty as part of a regimental uni-
form. There was many a pretty foot coquettishly peeping
from beneath a quilted petticoat to be hastily hidden by the
black-eyed owner, when she noticed the stranger’s approach.
A smart young fellow, hat in hand, came forward to know if
the ‘jintleman’ would like to see an Irish jig or a ‘toe the
plank ’—a feat which was performed by two men dancing a
wild sort of horn-pipe with a wonderful variety of turnings.
and twistings, capers and wrestlings, as trials of skill and
strength, on a board or door laid on the ground, until one
was forced to yield and lose his balance. Of course a reward
was expected, though not asked, and a cheer given for the
‘jintleman’ by the actors and spectators. An empty flask.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XXili

then made its rounds for the whiskey that was not in it, but

hoped for. One old crone noticed my husband’s foreign habit

of taking snuff, and hobbling up to him presented her own

snuff-box, with a significant tap to show that it was empty.

It was a tiny receptacle and was replenished at once, to her

infinite satisfaction. Among the older women there were

many sad and anxious faces, while the younger ones were

bright and evidently hopeful for the future. Two nice-look-

ing girls interested me, they were so neat and quiet in com-

parison with the others. One had a piece of very beautiful

work in her hand, which she hastily concealed in the bosom .
of her dress. ‘It is only a bit of our Irish lace,’ she said, in’
answer to my inquiry, ‘and it is not nice, it is not clean!’

Poor thing, how could she keep her thread and pretty work

clean amid such surroundings ? ‘

“The little steamer Pem-o-dash, the Indian word for
‘fire-boat,’ which was to convey us across the lake and up
the river to Peterborough, had no cabin, was half-decked,
and carried a sail in addition to the steam propeller. When
she stopped to take in a supply of wood at a clearing about
half way, I seized the opportunity to land and gather some
of the splendid cardinal flowers that grew along the shores.
Here, too, I plucked as sweet a rose as ever graced an English
garden. There was also a bush resembling our hawthorn,
whickt on examination I found to be the Cockspur hawthorn.
It had fruit as large as cherries, pulpy and of a pleasant
flavor, not unlike tamarind. The thorns were of great length
and strength. Among the grasses of the meadow land I
found .spearmint, and, nearer to the bank, quantities of
peppermint, Owing to the rapids and the shallowness of the
river, the steamboat was unable to go up the whole way to
Peterborough, .so a large, unwieldly-looking scow had been
engaged to meet it at a point called the ‘Yankee Bonnet,’
so named from a fanciful resemblance the topmost branches
of a tree growing on the bank had to the sort of cap worn by

.
XXIV BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

the Yankees. The steamer, however, ran aground some four
miles below the rendezvous, This caused: a considerable
delay and gave rise to much ill-humor among the boatmen at
having ‘to row down to meet the steamer. The boat was.
heavily laden, the men surly, and night had closed in before
we heard the sound of the rapids ahead. The moon had now
risen, and the stars were shining brilliantly over the water,
which gave back the reflection of a glorious multitude of
heavenly bodies. A sight so surpassingly beautiful might
have stilled the most turbulent spirits, and I leaned back
against my husband’s supporting arm and looked from sky
to star-lighted river, from the river up to the sky, with
unspeakable delight and admiration. But my reverie was
rudely broken by the grounding of the boat against the
rocky bank, and the loud protests of the men against rowing
another stroke or attempting the rapids that night. We
were two miles distant from the town, the dark forest lay
gloomy and dense before us, and I was weak from illness and
want of food. To pass the night on an open scow, exposed
to the heavy dews and chill air, would be death. It was ten
o'clock, and the outlook was not encouraging. How were we
to make our way through an unknown forest to the town ?
“One of our fellow-passengers, whose house lay on the
opposite bank of the river, and who had engaged one of the
boatmen to put him across, yielded to Mr. Traill’s entreaties
to allow us to accompany him. Remaining only long enough
at this settler’s house to take a cup of tea, we procured the
services of a little Irish lad and a lantern to guide us through
the remaining bit of bush which still separated us from the
town, and set forth on our travels to seek a shelter for the
night. Our little Irish lad was very full of sympathy for the
‘English leddy who looked so tired.’ He told us of how he
had lost both father and mother from cholera at Montreal,
and was alone in the world without anyone to care for him.
Our way was crossed by a little stream, over which the only

’
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XXV

bridge was the rough trunk of a fallen tree. The heavy dew
had made it wet and slippery, and in crossing my head turned
dizzy and I slipped, wetting my feet, thereby adding one
more to my other discomforts. Beyond the stream the forest
opened out into a wide grassy plain, and the lights from a.
few scattered houses told us we were on the site of the now
populous city of Peterborough.

““« Now, mistress, and yer honor,’ said our little guide,
‘here is the Government House, an’ I cannot show ye any
furder bekase I don’t know any of the town beyant, but I'll
call up Mr. Roseberry, an’ shure he’ll guide ye to the hotel.’

‘‘Mr Roseberry’s man obeyed the summons, and appearing
in a wonderful deshabille, directed us to Mr. McFadden’s
hotel, which, if not shut up, would afford us a night’s
lodging. Hurrying down the steep hill we found the house
still open, but only to learn that there was no room, every
available space being occupied by a recent influx of newly-
arrived emigrants. This seemed the crowning misfortune to
a disastrous day. We inquired how far we were from Mr.
Stewart’s—friends to whom we had brought letters from
Montreal—and were told his house was a long two miles off.
We then asked for Mr. Strickland’s, only to receive the reply
that he lived a day’s journey farther on. It seemed as if
there would be no alternative but a lodging under the stars,
when a woman’s kindly hand was laid on my arm, and J was
led into the house by the mistress of the little inn. Mrs.
McFadden had been listening to our inquiries, and the names
Stewart and Strickland attracting her attention, had induced
her to make an effort on our behalf. The kind woman put
me in a chair by the blazing log fire, and giving directions to
a stout Irish girl to bring some warm water and attend to
my wet feet, she mixed a hot drink and insisted upon my
taking it. The warmth was most grateful, and while I was
being thus cared for I could look about me.

“Truly the scene was a novel one. The light from the
XXvi BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

fire illumined’ the room, showing every available space
occupied almost to the. very verge of the hearth. Men,
women and children were sleeping on improvised beds,
bundles of: all sizes and shapes forming pillows for their
shaggy heads. Some lay on the long dresser, some on. the
bare floor beneath it—all sleeping the sleep of the weary.

“ As soon as she saw I was warm and more comfortable,
my hostess showed me to the only place in the house that
they had to give us. It was a tiny dormitory, more like. a
bird-cage than anything else. The walls were lathed, but
without plaster, and both air and light were ‘freely admitted.
However, it had a clean bed in it, and I was glad to lie down
and watch the river dancing in the moonlight and listen to
the rush of the rapids until I fell asleep.

“The following morning a message was sent to my brother
to let him know of our arrival, and that evening he ran the
rapids in his canoe, and we met again after seven long years
of separation.”

Mrs. Traill remained in Peterborough with their kind friends,
Mr. Stewart and his family, while her husband returned with
Mr. Strickland to his clearing on the shores of Lake Katche-
wanook, the first of the chain of lakes of which the Otonabee
is the outlet. Mr. Strickland had taken up land there for the
many advantages the locality offered. There was good soil,
fine timber, excellent water-power, rich mineral deposits, and
the probability or remote certainty that at some future date
the lakes would be connected by canals, the river made navi-
gable by the construction of locks, and a water highway be
obtained from Lake Huron via Lake Simcoe to the Bay of
Quinte and the St. Lawrence, an expectation which appears
about to have the first steps taken towards its accomplishment.

Mr. Traill drew his Government grant of land in the neigh-
borhood, the principal portion being in Verulam township, the
smaller in Douro, and by the purchase of an additional grant
secured a water frontage. Until he could build a house they
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XXVil

lived with Mr. Strickland, during which time Mrs. Traill
became initiated into the ways of life in the bush. In her
“ Backwoods of Canada,” there is a very pretty description of
these first few months of life in Canada, and of her acquaint-
ance with the natural history surrounding her new home.

On the 11th of December, 1833, they moved into the new
house, which was duly named “ Westove.” Here they lived
seven happy years, for though they had to endure all the hard-
ships and trials inseparable from the early settlement of the
bush, they yet were busy and hopeful, happy in the society of
each other and the neighborhood of her brother and his family.
Mr. Moodie had also moved up from his first location near
Cobourg, in February, 1834, and bought land’ on the Douro
side of the lake, about a mile beyond Mr. Strickland’s
homestead.

The erection of a good saw-mill and a bridge over the river
4]so gave them readier access to a market at Peterborough
and to their friends, and tended to lessen the loneliness of the '
situation. They all had suffered at times from the low fever
and ague, and the various vicissitudes of farm-life, but were
always ready to help each other or their less fortunate
neighbors.

In 1835, Mrs. Traill again took up her pen. The “ Back-
woods of Canada” was written, and in 1836 was published in
London by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street, for the “Library
of Entertaining Knowledge” Series: This volume contained
much valuable information for intending emigrants, and had
a wide circulation. Though al] the hardships and discomforts
of life in the bush were told with graphic fidelity, they were
described with a cheerful and optimistic pen, as of one who
had a far-seeing eye into the future capabilities of the country
and a present knowledge of its boundless resources and value,
so that the picture of the rough life did not deter many from
venturing to embark their all in the effort to make a better
home for themselves and their children in the New World, but
XXVili BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

rather the reverse. The author’s cheerful, happy spirit had
robbed the backwoods of its terrors.

When the rebellion of 1837 broke out, Mr. Traill—as did
every other half-pay officer in the clearing—hastened to offer
his services to the Government.

“The tidings of the rising was brought to our clearing from
Peterborough,” writes Mrs. Traill, “the messenger arriving at
midnight through the snow to call all loyal men to the defence
of their country. No time was lost that night, and before dawn
I said farewell to my husband. The next day my maid left
me—she had a lover and must go and keep him from going to,
the wars—then the man-servant had to follow and see about
his people ; so there I was alone in the bush with three small.
children, the eldest scarcely four years old. Jamie and I had
to roll in the logs for the fire. He was the cleverer of the two,
for he tied a rope to the log, and with his baby help I man-
aged to keep the fires going until a neighbor came to help us.”

Mr. Traill, however, only went as far as Cobourg, for by
the time the men there were enrolled, orders countermanding
their march came from Toronto, and, after some weeks of
vexatious delay and uncertainty, they were disbanded and
returned to their homes. Mr. Moodie had, however, gone
direct to Toronto, and, being commissioned in one of the regi-
ments serving on the Niagara frontier, his return was delayed
for months. During this long winter Mrs. Traill was often
with her sister, and Mr. Moodie,,in several of his letters,
speaks most gratefully of their kindness to his wife.

In the sketch, ‘The First Death in the Clearing,” Mrs.
Traill gives an instance of how she was called upon to go to
the bedside of sorrow or sickness, and reading between the
lines one can see what a comfort her loving sympathy must
have been to the bereaved mother. Jessie is still alive and
often visits Mrs. Traill, bringing her kindly offerings of fresh
eggs and butter from the farm. Last summer when Mrs.
Traill was so ill that few thought she would recover, Jessie’s
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. Xxx

grief was great. She recalled over and over again the kind-
ness to her in the bush in those early days. “Ay, an’ she
was sae bonnie; sic a bonnie leddy, wi’ her pink cheeks an’’
her blue e’en, an’ she was sae lovin’ and dear; my, but Pll
greet sair if she is ta’en away!” But Jessie’s prayers for the
recovery of the dear old friend were answered, and we have
her with us still.

In 1839, Mr. Traill sold the farm on the lake, and bought
a house and lot in what was lately known as Ashburnham,
now a part of Peterborough, where they lived until 1846,
when they removed to Rice Lake, and subsequently pur-
chased “ Oaklands.”

Meanwhile Mrs. Traill had not been idle. They were very
poor, as all settlers of Mr. Traill’s class and education were
in those days, unfitted for the rough life and to cope with the
difficulties which the work entailed, and his wife’s pen was
frequently the means of keeping the wolf from the door. She
wrote many short stories and sketches for the magazines both
in England and the States, the Anglo-American being one of
those in the latter country; and, in 1850, ‘“‘ Lady Mary and
her Nurse,” more familiar to present-day readers as “ Afar
in the Forest,” was published. In this little volume there is
a story of the grey squirrels, that used to be the delight of my
early childhood. —

The Traills had removed from Ashburnham to “ Wolf
Tower,” a house belonging to Mr. Bridges, which attained
some celebrity ; from there they went to live in a small log-
house on a rise called Mount Ararat, above a deep ravine on
the shares of Rice Lake, and it was here, among the actual
surroundings, so well depicted on its pages, that Mrs. Traill
wrote “The Canadian Crusoes.” It was published by Messrs.
Hall & Vertue, London, and later the copyright of both it
and “Lady Mary and her Nurse” were bought by Messrs.
Nelson & Sons, Edinburgh. These books have gone through
many editions and been issued under more than one title,
XXX BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

given them by the publisher, but the authoress has not
received any further remuneration than the £50 paid for
the copyright. They are now on sale in every bookshop as
“Lost in the Backwoods” and “ Afar in the Forest.”

After the purchase and removal to “Oaklands,” “ A Guide
for the Female Emigrant” was written and published in
London. Owing to some mismanagement of her editor and
the publisher, the authoress received very-small return for
this useful little book.

Mrs. Traill’s family now numbered nine, four sons and five
daughters (of whom only two sons and two daughters survive),
yet, with all the cares and anxiety, as well as the necessary
work which the bringing up of a young family entailed, added
to the hard labor of farm-life, her love of flowers and for
natural history in general was a continual source of pleasure
and eventually of profit. She lost no opportunity of studying
the botany of the country, and was ever seeking for new
specimens to add to her herbarium or collection of dried
flowers, ferns and mosses, and making notes of the locality
and conditions of their growth. This is still one of her chief
pleasures and occupations ; she has the gleanings of last sum-
mer now ready to put down during the coming winter months.

On the 26th of August, 1857, owing to some cause or acci-
dent never ascertained, the crowning misfortune of all the
losses in the bush happened. They were burnt out and lost
absolutely everything—all the treasures they had striven so
hard to save, books, manuscripts and other valuables, the
family barely escaping with their lives. Mr. Traill felt the
loss very much, especially of his books. He never quite
recovered the shock and sorrow of seeing his family thrown
thus homeless on the world. Their eldest son was married ;
the youngest was only a child of ten years. Mr. Strickland
and other friends were most kind, helpful and sympathetic,
but the loss could never be recovered.

They stayed for some time with Mrs. Traill’s brother, Mr.
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XXX1

Strickland, and then removed to a house placed at their
service by their friend Mrs. Stewart, where Mr. Traill died,
after a short but severe illness.

Upon her husband’s death, Mr. Strickland urged Mrs.
Traill to return to the old neighborhood of their first settle-
‘ ment, now a thriving village, and her daughter Mary obtain-

ing a position as teacher in the school there, they returned to
live once more on the banks of the Otonabee. Mrs. Traill
had several times during these years sent home small collec-
tions of pressed ferns and mosses. These found a ready sale
in England. One of these collections attracted the attention
of Lady Charlotte Greville, who succeeded in so interesting
Lord Palmerston in Mrs. Traill’s literary work as to obtain
for her a grant of £100 from a special fund.

With this unexpected and welcome present Mrs. Traill
purchased the house and lot where she now lives, and which
with a loving thought of her husband’s old home in the
Orkneys and of their first home in the bush, she has called
“ Westove.”

Lady Charlotte Greville also sent her a large package of
seeds and a screw-press, with which she could press her ferns
more effectually.

In 1869, her botanical notes were utilized in supplying the
letter-press for her niece, Mrs. FitzGibbon’s “Canadian Wild
Flowers,” and in 1884, Mrs. Traill published her “ Studies of
Plant Life in Canada,” also illustrated by her niece, now
‘Mrs. Chamberlin.

While the latter book was in the press, Mrs. Traill paid a
visit to Ottawa and enjoyed the pleasure of meeting many
who had been interested in her work, of renewing old friend-

_ships and making the personal acquaintance of many with
whom she had corresponded on kindred subjects. She was
also greatly indebted to Mr. James Fletcher, of the Experi-
mental Farm, for his kind aid in reading the proofs of her
book. \
XXXii BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

Mrs. Traill went to Government’ House, and took a lively
interest in the gay scenes on the skating rink and toboggan
slides, as smiling and happy as the youngest among us, and
winning admiration and affection from all those who had the
pleasure of seeing her. It was during this visit to Ottawa
that the photograph was taken from which the engraving
forming the frontispiece to the present volume is made. Mrs.
Traill was then in her eighty-fourth year.

The fac-simile engraving shown on the page facing this
portrait of Mrs. Traill is taken from part of a letter written
recently to a friend whom she values highly. It is interest-
ing not only as a specimen of the handwriting of one of
such advanced years, but also as indicating the unaffected
piety of her life.

“Studies of Plant Life” is now «a rare book, chance copies
selling for three times the original price.

Mrs. Traill had always received kindly presents from her
sisters in England, and during the last few years of their lives
they were in a better position to help her and add to the
comforts of her home surroundings. The copyright of the
“Queens of England,” left her by her sister Agnes, although
sold for half its value, has added a little to her very small
income.

In 1893, hearing of the likelihood of the sale of the little
island in Stony Lake, where a poor Indian girl was buried,
Mrs. Traill wrote to the Department at Ottawa to ask that
it should be granted her. It was but a tiny island, and her
anxiety to preserve the Indian girl’s grave from desecra-
tion induced her to take this step. Mr. Sandford Fleming
kindly interested himself in her behalf, and the request was
granted.

The following extract from her old friend’s announcement
is so gratifying to Mrs. Traill that I cannot refrain from
quoting it:

“T have the pleasure to inform you that by the same post
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. XXXili

you will receive a patent for ‘Polly Cow’s Island,’ in the
river Otonabee, township of Douro.

“Tt has been.a great pleasure to everyone here, from the
highest to the lowest official, to do everything in their power
to do you honorable service and gratify your every wish-—
every one of them feeling that the most any of them can do
is but the smallest acknowledgment which is due to you for
your life-long devotion to Canada.”

The patent is beautifully engrossed by hand and is highly
valued by the owner.

Another honor paid Mrs. Traill was the compliment of
calling a remarkable form of the fern Aspidium marginale,
which she found growing near the village of Lakefield, on a
vacant town lot that was only partially cleared from the
forest trees, Mrs. Traill’s Shield Fern—A. marginale (Swz.)
var: Traillee—is not the least valued by her.

There have been many events in Mrs. Traill’s life not men-
tioned in this brief biographical introduction to her book,
such as bereavements, in the death of two of her sons and her
daughter Mary—trials patiently borne and sorrows suffered
that had overwhelmed her but for her trust in Providence
and her unfailing reliance on His will. I have passed them
by, not because they are without interest, but because it
would be turning back a cloud of sorrow to dim the dear old
eyes with tears, and hide for awhile the silver lining that has
glorified her life.

She has given such pretty glimpses of her home by the
Otonabee, in the sketches, that I should only spoil it were I to
attempt to describe it in greater detail, Anyone seeing her
now in the pretty sitting-room, busy with her gay patchwork,
stitching away at quilts for the Indian Missionary Auxiliary
basket, or putting down the ferns and mosses gathered last
summer during her visit to the island of Minnewawa, and
watching the light in her blue eyes, the smile on her soft old
face, unwrinkled by a frown, or listening to her clever con-
XXXIV BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH.

versation, sparkling with well-told anecdotes and incidents of
men and things garnered during her long life and retained.
with a memory that is phenomenal, would realize that the
secret of her peaceful old age, her unclouded intellect, and the
brightness of her eye, is due to her trust in Providence, her
contentment with her lot, and a firm faith in the future where
a happy reunion with the loved ones awaits her.

The following lines, written on her mother’s eightieth birth-
day by Mrs. Traill’s third daughter, Mary (the late Mrs.
Muchall), though faulty in metre, are so descriptive that I
cannot end my brief sketch better than by quoting them :

"Eighty to-day is our mother,
A picture so peaceful and fair,
The lilies of fourscore summers
Asleep in her silvered hair.

‘‘Kighty to-day, yet the love-light
Shines as soft in her sweet blue eyes,
As touched with a ray from heaven
Of the peace that never dies.

“The happy spirit of childhood,
That with some is too quickly past,
Caught by some magic enchantment,
Is flooding her life to the last.

‘*Kighty to-day, and her children,
Near or far in a distant land,
Are strong sons and happy daughters,
A loved and a loving band.

“Tn our hearts she’ll live forever ;
When she leaves for a world more fair,
Her smile will be still more radiant
As she welcomes each dear one there,”
PREFACE

ALtTHouGH I lived the first few years of my childhood
at Stowe House, near Bungay, in the lovely valley of
the Waveney, most of my young life was spent at.
Reydon Hall, an old Elizabethan mansion in the eastern
part of the county of Suffolk, and within easy walk of
the sea-coast town of Southwold, now a much more
frequented seaside resort than in former days.

Business or pleasure often led us to the town, and the
beach was a great attraction and source of pleasure to.
my sisters and myself. We loved to watch the advance
and recoil of the waves, the busy fishermen among their
nets and boats, and the groups of happy children on
the sands; but there was a greater fascination still to
us in the search for treasures left by the flood-tide or
cast upon the shore by the ever restless waves.

Sometimes there was little to reward the seekers, but.
XXXV1 PREFACE.

hope was ever before us, and the finding of shining
stones—red, yellow and white—bits of jet or amber, a
shell or lovely seaweed, to be deposited in bag or basket,
would send us home jubilant to add to the hoarded
store of fossils and other garnered treasures, or to show
to the dear mother, who would turn the treasures over
and say with a smile, “ Let me see what precious pearls
my Katie has found among her many pebbles hardly
worth bringing home.”

Still the time was not wholly wasted. Health and
pleasure had been gained with my pebbles, and had
there been but one pearl among them, the simple heart
of the little maiden had been well content.

So, my readers, if you glean but one bright glad
thought from the pages of my little volume, or add but
one pearl to your store of knowledge from the expe-
rience of the now aged naturalist, she will not think
the time wasted that has been spent in gathering the
pebbles from note-book and journals written during the

long years of her life in the backwoods of Canada.

‘“‘Westove,” LAKEFIELD,
September 20th, 1894.
PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

PLEASANT DAYS OF MY
CHILDHOOD.

“* How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood,
When fond recollection presents them to view!
The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wildwood,
' And every loved spot which my infancy knew.”

THERE is something almost magical in the word May.
It brings back to memory pictures of all things sweet
and fair that charmed us in our youthful days; it recalls
the joys of infancy when we filled our laps with flowers.

We hear again the song of blackbird, linnet and
robin, and the far-away call of that mystery of child-
hood, the cuckoo. We hear the murmur of the summer
wind among the rustling green flags beside the river ;

we scent the flowers of the hawthorn, and the violets '
4
38 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

hidden among the grass, and fill our hands with blue-
bells and cowslips.

But we have in Canada few such May days as
Shakespeare, Milton and Herrick ‘describe; here too
often it may be-said that “ Winter, lingering, chills the
lap of May.”

The inborn sense of the beautiful springs. to life in
the soul of the babe when it stretches forth an eager
hand to grasp the flowers in its nurse’s bosom. It is the
birth of a new and pleasurable emotion. I love to see
an innocent child playing with the fresh fair flowers,
meet emblems at once of its own beauty and frailty ;
for does not the Word say, “He cometh forth like a
flower, and is cut down.”

It was on the banks of that most beautiful of Suffolk
rivers, the Waveney, that the first happy years of my
childhood were passed. My father’s family came from
the north of England, where among the mountain dales
and fells still lingered many primitive customs and
ancient rural sports. Of these the keeping of May
Day—no doubt a relic of some ancient pagan rite, but,
the origin forgotten, now perfectly harmless—was one
of the most cherished. My father still clung to the old
observance of this rural holiday of his ancestors, and
May Day was looked forward to with eager anticipation
by my sisters and myself.

The flowers—the sweet May blossoms of the haw-
thorn hedge anJ the e.wly spring flowers—must be
PLEASANT DAYS OF MY CHILDHOOD. 39

gathered while the dew was still upon them, or the rites
lost half their virtue. :

We were always up before the sun, and so eagerly
did we watch for the day that even our dreams were
haunted by the anticipated pleasure, for I remember my
mother telling of being startled in the night by seeing
the door softly open and a small white-robed figure glide
up to the bedside. It was Sara, her eyes wide open,
fixed and staring, but the ¢hild was fast“asleep. Two
tiny hands held up the full folds of her night-dress as
she said, “ Flowers, more flowers, Lila.” Even in her
sleep she had gathered dream-flowers for the May Day
garlands. ,

I was the youngest but one, and being an especial pet
in the household, on my happy head was conferred the
May crown, and I was duly greete| as Queen of May.

Surely no queen could have been more joyous or
proud of her honors: my crown a circlet of flowers, my
sceptre a flower-wreathed wand of hazel, and my throne
a mound of daisy-sprinkled turf in the meadow by the
clear flowing river; my loyal subjects, the dearest and
most loving of sisters. 2

The crown so coveted was worn till night, and then
cast asidé to wither in the dust. Sic transit gloria
mundi !

Within a short distance of the old house there was a
narrow bridle-path which we called the “ little lane.”
It was shut in from the main road, with which it ran.
40 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

parallel, by a quick-set hedge; on the other side were
high sloping banks, the unfenced boundary of upland
pastures.

On the grassy slopes grew tall oak trees and a tangled
jungle of wild bushes, among which woodbine and
sweet briar entwined, forming luxuriant bowers, beneath
which all sorts of flowers grew in rich profusion.

On the other, or lower side of the lane, a little tinkling
rill, that a child might step across, ran down, its water
clear and bright. From this slender streamlet we chil-
dren drank the most delicious draughts from Nature’s
own chalice, the hollow of our hands, or sipped its pure
waters, like the fairies we read of, from the acorn cups
that strewed the grass.

The banks of the stream were lined with sweet
purple violets, primroses, and the little sun-bright
celandine ; and later on there was good store of wild
strawberries, which we gathered and strung upon a stalk
of grass to carry home to our mother as a peace-offering
for torn frocks and soiled pinafores, or leave out-stayed.

This charming spot was our Eden. In it we laid out
beds and planted a garden for ourselves. Like Canadian
squatters, we took to ourselves right of soil, and made a
free settlement sans cérémonie. The garden was laid
out right daintily. The beds were planted with double
daisies and many garden bulbs and flowers discarded or
begged from the gardener’s parterres. A hollow in the
bank was fashioned into a grotto, which we lined with
PLEASANT DAYS OF MY CHILDHOOD. 41

moss and decorated with dry striped snail-shells and
bright stones.

Our garden tools were of the rudest—our trowel a
rusty iron ladle, our spade a broken-bladed carving-
knife, and we daily watered the flowers from a battered
tin tea-pot and a leaky japanned mug. But in spite of

‘these unhandy implements, the garden throve and
blossomed in the wilderness.

There, sheltered from sun and shower among the
bowery honeysuckles, we reclined on the green turf,
happy as children could be, and listened to the oft-
repeated stories and old ballads that were recited by our
two elder sisters. How we delighted in those tales and
quaint old rhymes, and how little we dreamed that the
time would come when the sisters who regaled us with
them would make a name for themselves in the world of
letters.*

Many years afterwards I visited the “little lane.” A
few crocuses and snowdrops, choked by long grass and
weeds, were, all that were left to mark the spot where
“once a garden smiled.”

I stooped and as of old drank of the bright little
stream, and gathered a nosegay of the sweet violets to
carry away as a souvenir of my childhood. Often in
after years have the memories of those May days among
the cowslips and daisied meads of the Waveney come
back to my wearied soul to cheer and soothe the exile
in her far distant forest home.

 

* Elizabeth and Agnes Strickland.
\
42

PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

LAMENT FOR THE MAY QUEEN.

Weep, weep, thou virgin Queen of May,
Thy ancient reign is o’er;

Thy vot’ries now are lowly laid,
And thou art Queen no more.

Fling down, fling down, thy flow’ry crown,
Thy sceptre cast away,

For ne’er again on vale or plain
They’ll hail thee Queen of May.

No maiden now with glowing brow
Shall rise with early dawn,

To bind her hair with chaplets fair
Torn from the blossomed-thorn.

No lark shall spring on dewy wing
Thy matin hymn to pour,

No cuckoo’s voice shall shout ‘‘ Rejoice ! ’
For thou art Queen no more.

Beneath thy flower-encircled wand
No peasant trains advance ;

No more they lead with sportive tread
The merry, merry dance.

The violet blooms with modest grace
Beneath its crest of leaves ;

The primrose shows her gentle face,
Her wreaths the woodbine weaves.

The cowslip bends her golden head,
And daisies deck the lea ; ;
But ah! no more in grove or bower

The Queen of May we'll see.
SUNSET AND SUNRISE ON LAKE
ONTARIO: A REMINISCENCE.*

‘*To watch the dimmed day deepen into even,
The flush of sunset melt in pallid gold;
While the pale planets blossom out in heaven ;
To feel the tender silence trance and hold
The night’s great heartbeats; soul-washed, nature-shriven,

To feel the mantle of silence fold on fold.”
—William Wilfrid Campbell.

Our steamer had been lying all day in front of the
town of Brockville. It was a gala day in that place.
There had been a successful launch of a newly-built
schooner to excite the townsfolk and attract strangers
from the American side across the St. Lawrence.

A military band was playing, and flags flew from the
steeples of the churches—on every public building,
indeed, was seen the Union Jack in friendly unison with
the Stars and Stripes.

*A page from my old diary, August, 1832.
44 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

The bells of the town rang cheerily in honor of a

wedding party, who later came on board our vessel on
their honeymoon trip to Niagara. Our departure was
delayed by the taking in of freight for the upper
provincial towns, and the landing of such as had been
forwarded to Brockville, as well as by the late arrival
of a number of extra passengers, so that it was well
on towards evening before we left the wharf and
entered the intricate channels of the Lake of the
Thousand Isles.
, The day had been excessively hot, and grateful was
the change to the cool refreshing shades of the wooded
islands, where oak and ash and elm mingled their
branches with those of the dark feathery hemlock, pine
and balsam firs. The grey cedars, too, delighted the
eye which had become wearied with the glare of the
sun upon the glassy surface of the water.

Our progress was slow and steady, for in those early
days of steam navigation much caution was shown, and
‘truly the passenger immigrants on board were in no
hurry, for the “wide world was all before them, where
to choose their place of rest.”

Every turn of the paddle-wheels brought some new
and lovely spot into view. Visions of pleasant rustic
homes to be made by forest, lake and river rose to my
mental vision as our vessel threaded her way among
those fairy islands; and with almost childish delight I
would point out wild rocky headlands bright with
SUNSET AND SUNRISE ON LAKE ONTARIO. 45

golden lichens and deep green velvet mosses, or inland
coves half hidden by drooping ferns and native willows
or red with the changeful crimson of the glossy-leafed
American Creeper (Ampelopsis Virginica), which was
already wreathing in gorgeous autumnal colors the
silvery bark of the graceful birches and elms.

What tufts of golden rod and pale bluebells, what
starry asters were mirrored in the calm waters! What
glorious spikes of cardinal lobelias and azure-fringed
gentians were growing wild and free on many a rugged
spot where possibly no foot of man had ever trodden !

The captain said it would be midnight ere we
reached Kingston, the “Limestone City,” and dawn
before we could be at Cobourg, where our voyage was
to terminate. Thence our way would lie northward to
what was at that time the ultima thule of civilization
a forest wilderness beyond the infant settlement of the
new village of Peterborough,* then but a cluster of
log houses and squatters’ shanties.

Charmed by the romantic natural beauties of the
surrounding scene, no dread of the future rose up to
oppress me. Truly distance lent its enchantment to
cheer and animate my spirits.

The sun set that evening in a flood of rose and amber,
coloring the waveless surface of the lake with a radiance
such as my English eyes had never yet looked upon.

How lovely it was! My husband smiled at my

 

*Now a city of no mean importance in Ontario.
ii

46 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

i

enthusiasm. Had he ever beheld so glorious a sunset
before ?

“Yes, many a time, in Italy and in Switzerland;
often quite as beautiful.”

I wished to claim all the loveliness for Canada, the
country of our adoption and henceforth our home.

The after-glow of rose tints faded only to give place
to the tremulous rays of the now risen moon, giving’ a
yet greater charm to the scenery, deepening the shadows
or throwing objects into stronger relief. Then, later on,
as star after star came out, heaven seemed to cast
unnumbered glories at our feet in these twinkling points
of light mirrored in the lake. Almost unconsciously the
inspired words rose to my lips, “ The heavens declare
the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His
handiwork.”

Wrapped in my ample Scotch tartan cloak, I lay
with head pillowed on my husband’s folded plaid, too
much delighted with my surroundings to leave the deck
for the cabin and the sleeping-berth below.

Sometimes our vessel passed so near the rocks that
the overhanging boughs of the trees almost swept the
sides of the smoke-stack, startling from their night roosts
flocks of blackbirds and pigeons. Flying out they
circled around us, then settled again among the trees.
The distant hooting of the big cat-owl was the only
sound that broke the monotonous plash of the paddle-
wheels. The only other living thing that I noted was
SUNSET AND SUNRISE ON LAKE ONTARIO. 47

the motionless figure of a heron standing on a fallen
cedar overhanging the margin of the water. When
our approach disturbed her night-watch for prey, she
spread her grey wings and noiselessly flew onward to
take her stand once more on some other prostrate tree.
There was a sort of witch-like weirdness about this
lonely watcher of the waters, such that I could not help
but follow her silent, mysterious flight and observe the
shadow of her wings upon the lake.

Fascinated by the bird, I watched her until weariness
overtook my senses, when my eyes closed and I slept so
soundly that it was not till the clanging bell gave notice
to the passengers that we were nearing the site of the
frontier town of Cobourg that I awoke.

If the night had been lovely, so also was the dawn, as
the sun rose in robes of the most exquisite colors. The
boat was now bearing in nearer to the shores of what
appeared to be a rolling country, all clothed with forest
green. Hill rising above hill came out from the clouds
of morning mist, far away to the distant northern limits
of the horizon, till mingling with the grey they melted
into a mere cloud line to the eye.

Around us, gilded by the rays of the rising sun, the
smooth surface of the lake shone like a sea of gold, the
spray from the paddle-wheels catching a thousand rain-
bow hues as it fell. Surpassingly beautiful were the
clouds of mist as they broke into all sorts of fanciful
forms, rising higher and higher, anon taking the appear-
48 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

ance of islands, above which the dark fringe of forest-
clothed shores was visible, while the white creamy
vapors below made mimic lakes and streams.

Then in a moment all was changed. The mirage of
the shadowy landscape disappeared ; a breath of cool air
from the water separated the mist and lifted it like
a gold-tinted veil, high above the trees, capes, islands,
bays and forest-crowned headlands, until all faded away,
leaving but a dream of beauty on the gazer’s mind—a
memory to be recalled in after years when musing over
past scenes of a life where lights and shadows form a
mingled pattern of trials and blessings.
MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING.*

‘« Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky ;
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night,
For thou must die.”

— Herbert.
Just such a day as holy George Herbert describes
above is this sweet May morning. But what a change
since yesterday in the temperature of the air! Then
chilling north-east winds, grey cloudy sky, cold and
cheerless ; now, bright cloudless blue sky and soft balmy
airs.

Yesterday I was wrapped in a thick woollen shawl
over my shoulders, and a warm quilted hood on my
head. To-day my morning wrapper of printed calico
and my muslin cap are all-sufficient for warmth ; hood
and shawl are laid aside. ¥

Our spring is unusually late this year; the leaves are

 

“From my diary of 1888.
50 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

not unfolded. I lie upon the couch on the veranda
basking in the delicious warmth of the sun’s rays as
they reach me through the half-clothed branches of
the maple and beech trees in the grove beyond my
garden. I recall last year at this same date when all
the trees were in leaf and the plum and apple trees in
full bloom. We are three weeks later this year. Well,
it is folly to complain of the vicissitudes of the seasons ;
let us take the blessings as they come to us and be
thankful—the leaves and buds and blossoms are all
before us. It is a pleasure to lie here and watch the
birds as they flit to and fro so gaily among the trees .
and garden shrubs, carolling and twittering in the
unalloyed gladness of their nature quite heedless of my
presence. Let me see who of my old acquaintances are
among them. There are the neat little snow sparrows
(Junco hyemalis), which are among the first and most
constant of the small birds to visit us, coming from the
cold North-West to make spring and summer holiday in
our more genial climate. In mild winters they were
wont to come as early as the middle of March, but that
was in the early days of the colony, when the thick
forests gave warm shelter to the wild-birds; but since
the trees are fast disappearing, the snow sparrows and
crossbills (Loxia curvirostru), and the tom-tits or
black-caps,* and many others, delay their coming till
April or even May. I used to call the pretty snow

 

* Chickadee of the Americans—Parus atricapillus.
MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING. 51

sparrows my “ quaker birds,’ when first I saw them and
did not know their name. I admired their exquisitely
neat plumage of slate-grey, white breast, darker head,
flesh-colored bills and legs and feet, with some snow-
white feathers at the tail, and the edges of the long
shaft-feathers of their wings also tipped with white.
They looked so tidy and delicate, as if no speck or spot
could sully their quakerly neat dress.

These birds usually appear in company with the small
brown and the chestnut-crowned sparrows,* with which
they seem to be on the most friendly terms, mixing with
them as they flit about the garden seeking for seeds
among the dry amaranths and other weeds.

The snow-birds and their friends, the chipping spar-
rows, are busy now in the bushes in the grove building
their nests. In this they have no time to lose, as the
season is so late.

A lively burst of song greets me just above my head,
in the angle of the beams of the veranda. How well I
know the cheerful notes! It is the dear little brown
house wren’s song.

Yes, there they are, the bright little couple. They
look down shyly at me from their coigne of vantage
above; and then, as if quite sure it is an old and trusted
friend they burst out with a joyous chorus of greeting,
as if to say:

“Here we are again; glad to see you alive and well,

 

*Chipping sparrow—Spizella socialis.
52 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

old lady.” And the old lady looks up, and nods a hearty
welcome to the tiny brown birds.

It is now more than twenty. years since a pair of
these little wrens came and took possession of that
corner of the veranda, just where the angle of the
rafters meet the roof—a dark, snug little place. There;
year after year, every May, a pair return to the old spot.

It can hardly be the same old couple, or even their
children or grandchildren, that are such constant visitors,
never at a loss, but coming at once to the old corner,
where, after a few days’ rest, they commence to build a
rudely-constructed nest of birch twigs; no moss, nor
hair nor any soft materials are employed for the cradles
of the tiny little brood.

What brings these tiny birds back to the old summer
haunts? Is it memory? Or is it that unerring, mys-
terious power that we term InsTINcT, which, acting
like an irresistible impulse, guides them the right way,
straight to the harbor where they would be ?

Is it this that draws the fledglings of last year back to
the nest in which they were reared, to re-enact the life
and habits of the parent-birds of the particular species of
the wren family to which they especially belong? We
know not.

For the first week after they arrive the wrens do
nothing but flit gaily about, making high holiday with
merry songs before they settle down to work in good
earnest.
MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING. 53.

The first thing they do is to clear away the old rubbish
from last year’s nest—a regular course of house-cleaning
—before the foundation of the new nest is laid. In the
work of building both labor. They are not selfish, my
dear little household pets, like some of the male birds,
which leave all the work of building and care of the
nurslings to the female, while they take their ease, eat-
ing and singing and enjoying themselves.

The wrens arrive just before the first hatch of the
May-flies issue from their watery prison. It is with the
smaller ephemera, the two-oared flies, that they feed
their young.

Is it not marvellous the instinct which impels these
little birds to return at the exact time of the year to
where the particular kind of nourishment required for
the little broods can only be obtained ?

O wondrous law, given by their Creator to each one
of His creatures, in accordance with His will and their
several needs ! ;

All day long, from sunrise to sunset, these birds are on
the. wing, as soon as the little ones are hatched, going
and coming unweariedly, with a love for their offspring
that never tires.

Listen to the song of greeting they give to the nest-
ling as they drop the fly into the open beak, having first
torn off its stiff gauzy wings. This is a constant habit,
and it is very dexterously done. In an instant the birds
are again on the wing, to supply the ceaseless cravings

J ,
54 ‘PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

of the greedy little ones, who seem ever to be crying
out, “ Give, give,” when they hear the approach of the
father or mother.

Last summer our wrens raised three successive broods.

I do not think the number exceeded five little birds each —
time. This year the time will not admit of an extra
hatch.

The wrens usually linger with us till the end of
August, but some will stay into September if the
weather remains warm. Then they leave us to winter
in a milder climate westward or southward, crossing the
St. Lawrence or Niagara rivers guided by the same
power that led them hither.

How little, after all, is our knowledge of the ways of
these wild creatures that come to us, we only guess from
whence. They steal so quietly among us. One day they
are seen building their temporary nests in our groves and
forests, in our garden bushes and orchards, in the shade
trees of our busiest streets, under the eaves of our houses
and even of our churches and sacred temples; a few
brief weeks or months, and lo! they disappear. Silently
they came; as silently they depart. Some, indeed, gather
together in social bands, but others steal away unseen ;
we know not how and when they go till we miss them,
to see them no more again till the spring of another
year. eee

While I am pondering over these mysteries, a pair
of gay summer yellow birds flash past me, evidently
’

MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING. 55

bent on important business. They are probably seeking
a convenient bush where to commence the building of
a nest for the reception of their unknown family.

I can fancy the lively discussion that is being carried
on between the little pair, where to make choice of the
best and safest situation for the nest.

That syringa opposite the drawing-room window is
sure to be chosen. Every succeeding season it has had
a nest built among its network of small branches, leaves
and fragrant blossoms. It is the favorite resort of the
little yellow birds.* Some call these birds “wild
canaries,” but there is a great difference between the
species, the true wild canary being larger, of a pale
lemon color, and the head marked in the male bird
with a spot of black, also the wing feathers. It is a true
finch, feeding on seeds, especially those of the thistle.

But I am interested in the movements of my little
friends. There is evidently some demur about the fitness
of the syringa bush—they seem to be debating between
it and a Tartarian honeysuckle near the wicket gate
—but time is pressing and a hasty choice must be
made,

Yes, the faithful little pair have chosen the old syringa
and are going to work at once.

Good-speed to you, my wise little couple. We shall
soon see the result of. your work, for I perceive your
plans are all settled now.

 

* Yellow Warbler, or Summer Bird—Dendroica estiva.
A
56 PEARLS AND PEBBLES. ‘

Some two years ago a great event happened to a pair
of my yellow birds, which ended in a serious disappoint-
ment. One warm May morning, as my daughter and I
sat sewing on the veranda, a little passing puff of wind
blew away some snips of the white material that we
had been busy with and carried them among the grass
just below the syringa bush, where the foundation of a
nest had just been laid by the female bird. Her
bright eyes quickly caught sight of the scraps of muslin,
and down she came from her perch in the bush and
carried off the prize to her nest, coming back and
diligently picking up all the bits she could see. Noticing.
that she was so well pleased with this new building
material, we added some more scraps and some tufts of
cotton wool to the supply. Charmed with her good .
fortune, and grown bolder, the pretty creature ventured
nearer to us and took all the scraps we chose to scatter
for her on the grass.

The work of building wen’ on so rapidly that in the
course of two hours she had constructed a most delicate
and dainty looking snow-white nest, and the pair took
possession of this novel-looking house with festal song.
Bat ah me! their joy was destined to be of but short
duration.

‘The best laid schemes o’ mice and men
Gang aft a-gley,”
and in the present case so it proved with our pair of
little architects.
 

 

 

RN

ng
ts

Bs

 

 

‘( WESTOVE,” RESIDENCE OF MRS. TRAILL.
MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING. 57

A heavy thunder-shower came on at noon of the next
day. I leave my readers to imagine the result. The
fairy-like palace, like all castles in the air, had collapsed,
and, “like the baseless fabric of a vision, left but a
wreck behind.” However, our brave little birdie cried,
“ Never say die!” and set to work once more, made wiser
by experience, building a more substantial nest in a
lilac bush close by; but with a feminine weakness for
finery she paid many visits to the frail ruin, selecting
such of the more substantial materials among the rags
as she found likely to prove useful in binding the walls
‘of the new nest together, but not sufficient to weaken
the more suitable articles which she wisely adopted for
her work.

The new nest was an excellent specimen of skill, and
the bits so judiciously woven in this time proved highly
ornamental. I fancied the little builder felt proud of
her work when it was finished, and we gave it unquali-
fied praise.

The ruined tenement excited the admiration of a cat-
bird.* She also had a taste for pretty soft bits of muslin
and gay scraps of colored prints ; so her ladyship set to
work very diligently to repair the now dilapidated nest
with the addition of dried fibrous roots, and grass, moss
and all sorts of trash, which, with the rags, were soon.
wrought up into a substantial nest which formed the
receptacle for five bluish-green eggs. But misfortune

 

* Galeoscoptes carolinen-is (Linn. ).

N
58 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

seemed to cling to the coveted nest, for an accident,
which might have ended fatally to the cat-bird, befel
her one day. When about to leave the nest her legs
became entangled in some loose strings which she had
woven among the other materials, and, unable to free
herself, she fell down head foremost into the midst of a
rosebush, very stout and spiny, out of which she could
not extricate herself, but lay fluttering and uttering the
most doleful cries, more like the yells of an enraged cat
than a bird.

The unusual outery brought me to the rescue, and at
my near approach she ceased her cries, and I truly
believe the poor captive looked to me for help. I quickly
perceived the cause of her disquiet, and with my scissors:
soon set her free. With a joyful cry she flew away, and,
what seemed to me a remarkable proof of sagacity in
the bird, she forsook the nest, never again venturing
back to it, though it contained the five blue eggs. She
evidently felt it better to forsake them unhatched than
run any risk of danger to. herself or her little brood.
This, at any rate, was my own conclusion on the subject,
though it may not have been that of the cat-bird.

While sitting on the eggs, and while the young ones
are yet unfledged and helpless, the mother-bird becomes
bold and excitable. If anyone approaches too near to
her nursery, she flies round the nest with outspread
wings uttering strange angry cries, as if resenting the
impertinent attempt to pry into her family affairs, and
MEMORIES OF A MAY MORNING. 59

should the intruder venture closer she would no doubt
punish him with strokes of her bill and wings.

The cat-bird belongs to the same family as the
southern mocking-bird,* and by many persons has
been known by the name of “ False Mocking-bird.”

It is a common idea that the note of the cat-bird is

\

most discordant, like the mewing of an angry cat; but
. this is, I think, a mistake. The true song of the cat-
bird is rich, full and melodious, more like that of the
English thrush.t In point of fact, this bird is the best
songster among the summer visitants in Canada.

I have fully satisfied myself that the harsh, wild
squalling ery attributed to the parent birds is that of
the young birds when the mother has forsaken them,
leaving them to shift for themselves, and, like weaned
children, the call is for food and companionship. This
is my own observation from watching the birds. «

 

* Mimus polyglottos. + Turdus melodious.

_
a
ANOTHER MAY MORNING.

‘The birds around me hopped and played ;
Their thoughts I cannot measure ;
But the least motion which they made
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

‘The budding twigs spread out their fan
To catch the breezy air ;
And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.”
— Wordsworth.

THIS morning, May 20th, I saw the first humming-
bird of the season, later than usual.

A lovely living gem is the Ruby-throated Humming-
bird,* with its brilliant ruby, green and gold colors flash-

 

* Ruby-throated Humming-bird—Trochilus Colubris (Linn.). Hab.—
Eastern North America to the Plains, north to the fur countries, and
south, in winter, to Cuba and Veragua. est, a beautiful specimen of
bird architecture, usually placed on the horizontal branch of a tree in the
orchard, composed of grey lichens, lined with the softest plant-down.
Eggs, two, pure white, blushed with pink while fresh.—McItwrarra,
“* Birds of Ontario.”
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 61

ing in the sunlight. The rapidity of its flight is greater
than that of any other bird. A dart and it is gone; we
scarce can follow it with the eye. Sometimes it will fly
in through an open window, hover a moment over the
flowers, cut or in pots, which have attracted it, then
dart away again into the sunshine. It is so delicate
that the least rough handling kills the lovely creature.

We are so late this year, the honeyed bells of the
scarlet rock columbine are not yet open. A few more
ssunny days and they will be out, and then the humming-
bird will have a feast. Meanwhile he is not starving,
but is busied with the blossoms of the sugar-maples in
the grove outside my garden.

What a sight those maples present just now! The
leaves are only beginning to burst from their brown
winter sheathing, but the tassels of pale yellow flowers
hang pendent from every spray, dancing in the light
warm air; every breath sets the delicate thready stalks
in motion, and the sunbeams brighten the flowers to
gold against the blue of the May-day sky.

Truly the trees are a sight to gladden the eye and to
lift up the rejoicing heart from earth to the throne of
the glorious God who has given such beauty to His

creatures to enjoy.

‘* Father of earth and heaven, all, all are Thine!
The boundless tribes in ocean, air and plain ;
And nothing lives, and moves, and breathes in vain ;
Thou art their soul—the impulse is divine !—

y
62 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Nature lifts loud to Thee her happy voice, .
And calls her caverns to resound Thy praise ;
Thy name is heard amid her pathless ways,
And e’en her senseless things in Thee rejoice.
O God! what homage shall he pour to Thee,
Whom Thou hast stamped with immortality!”
—Jane Roscoe.

This is a sweet, quiet spot. The river, the bright,
rapid Otonabee —the Indian word for “flashing water
running fast ”—lies at the foot of the grassy slope and
open grove of forest trees which divide my garden from
its shores. From the opposite bank the village cottages,
church spires and busy factory cast their shadows on
the stream.

There is a murmur of wheels and rushing rapids
from below the mill-dam, blended and softened to one
harmonious monotone, ever singing the same tuneless
song which soothes and never wearies on the ear.

"Tis pleasant to rest here in the sunshine and take in
the quiet surroundings of the spot. I had nearly fallen
asleep this warm morning, when I was roused by the
joyous carolling of the wrens on the lattice of the
veranda.

The mother bird is sitting, and her faithful mate
comes to cheer his little wife with gay songs. He does
not seem to heed me; he knows by experience that I
am an old friend.

I have often thought that before sin marred the
harmony of Nature the birds and animals were not
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 63

afraid of man, but rejoiced in his presence: that Adam
understood their language, and they knew his will,
obeying the voice of their master. Now, all is changed.
The timid and defenceless flee from man, as from an
enemy. His presence awakens hatred and fear in the
wild denizens of the forest, while the roar of the lion
and the howl of the wolf inspire his dread. It was not
SO once, and there is a promise that the old harmony
shall be restored, when “the earth shall be full of the
knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”

Three summers ago a Black-billed Cuckoo* visited
my garden and made her shallow nest of dried roots and
hay on the flat branch of a white spruce, not more than
six feet from the ground, so that she was easily seen as
she sat within it. \

I was attracted in passing the tree by the glitter of
her large lustrous black eyes, and, on approaching
nearer, by her soft rounded head, the snowy whiteness
of her breast and her delicate fawn-brown back and
wings. The silkiness of the plumage contrasted finely
with the dark horny bill and full black eyes.

The shallow saucer-shaped nest was not large enough
to contain the long tail, and it hung out beyond: the
edge.

* Black-billed Cuckoo—Coccyzus ‘Erythrophthalmus (Wils.). Hab.—
Eastern North America, from Labrador and Manitoba south to the West,
Indies and the valley of the Amazon; west to the Rocky Mountains.
Accidental in the British Islands and Italy. Nest, loosely constructed of
twigs, grass, strips of bark, leaves, etc., and placed in a bush. Eggs, two to
five, light greenish-blue.—McItwraitu, ‘‘ Birds of Ontario.”

 
64 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

J had never been so near to the cuckoo before, and was
struck by the beauty of the bird and her wise ways.

On a movement of my head in order to get a closer
peep at the pretty creature, she became alarmed and
silently dropped off the nest backwards, slyly slipping
out of sight among the grass and herbage below the
tree; then, noiselessly gliding away, she reappeared on
a tree beyond the garden and uttered a succession of
loud angry cries, each a distinct syllable— Kow ! .kow !
kow! kow!”—repeating them many times, as if to say
in threatening tones, “ How dare you look into my nest,
you big, disagreeable creature !” :

That was what she meant; so, knowing I was an
impertinent intruder, I retired to a little distance to
allow her to return to her four beautiful pale blue eggs,
pocketing the affront for the time, but often returning
to take a furtive peep at Mistress Cuckoo and hear her
scolding ery of “Kow! kow!” ;

I had hoped to make myself acquainted with the little
brood, but unluckily the nest was discovered by some
boys of bird-nesting propensities, or it may have been by
a cat. In fact I had my suspicions that one or other of
our own tom-cats may have been the culprit that robbed
the poor cuckoo of her eggs or newly hatched birds.

The common name “ Rain Crow ” was given the Black-
billed Cuckoo on account of her loud, oft-repeated note
being heard before rain.

There is another bird belonging to the Cuckoo family
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 65

that is common to North America and western or
southern Ontario, but is not often seen to the north
and east. This is the Yellow-billed Cuckoo (Coccyzus
Americunus), a bird of quiet and retiring habits, seen
generally in orchards and in groves on the banks of
rivers. .

May 21st.—Another lovely day. The air is full of
sweet sounds and lovely sights. The young leaves are
bursting on every spray of bush and tree.

Many of our wild-flowers that did n_t come forth in
their usual season, April, are now pushing out their
blossoms as if in haste to meet the tardy warmth which”
has been so long withheld from the earth this year. I
am glad to see them. Better late than never.

In the woods, under last year’s sheltering bed of
fallen leaves, they have bloomed because protected from
the chilling winds; but here in the open borders of my ,
garden they are late, very late. B.t why quarrel with
the delay, since I now see the milk-white stars of the
Blood-root, so large and fine, gleaming brightly in the
gay sunshine this May morning.

These beautiful flowers improve under cultivation,
and are double the size of those in the grove close by.

The flowers of the sweet Liver-leaf (Hepitica trilobu
and Leputicu rotundiflora) are all out, a crowd of lovely
starry blossoms of many hues—pink, blue, pale lilac and
pure white. Delicate in scent, too, they are. The new
spring leaves are unfolding, clothed with shining silk
66 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

and shaded with a purplish cloud in the centre. They
are already hiding the old withered and persistently ~
clinging foliage of last year, throwing it off as a worn-
out garment.

Here, late also, is the Spring Beauty (Claytonia Vir-
ginica), a frail and delicate flower. Its pink and white:
tinted and striped petals hardly look as if they could
bear the cold breath of early April, but it is really
hardy, and is not generally afraid of frost. This is,
‘however, an exceptional season, or we should have seen
the graceful Dog-tooth Violet (Liliwm erithronium)
showing its yellow drooping bells ere this date.

There is a large bed of these flowers just outside my
garden, but they will not condescend to enter within
cultivated ground, though I have often tried to coax the
obstinate beauties to take root with me. They love
their free-born liberty, and will have nothing to do
with me and civilized life. They cling to the leaf-mould,
and the shade of the maples and beeches, and need the
warm coverlet of scarlet and orange leaves the autumn
winds spread over them; and perhaps—who shall deny
it ?—they may miss the companionship of grasses and
ferns and mosses, or some native wild-flower that
mingles its roots and foliage among their own richly
spotted leaves.

The name “ Dog-tooth Violet,” by which this fair lily
is known, is surely a great misnomer. It has no affinity
with the violet. The first part of the name has been
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 67

derived from the white pointed bulb, which in color and
shape is like the sharp canine tooth of a dog. “Dog-
tooth Lily ” we might tolerate as more correct or appro-
priate. ,

The wood ferns are all unrolling their fronds. The
slender, delicate Maiden-hair we call the “Fairy Fern”
will soon be fluttering its tender leaflets like the young
birds in the wood set free of the parent nest.

Just now a flash of glorious color darted past me, and
I recognized at a glance the gorgeous plumage of the
Baltimore Oriole—gold, scarlet-orange and purply black
in varied contrasts. Beautiful is it beyond compare with
any of our summer visitors, and among our native birds
it has no peer.

The Baltimore is indeed “a thing of beauty and a joy
forever.” Once seen it is never forgotten. How eagerly
the eye follows its swift flight! But it is shy, and while
we long for a second sight it is gone. It will not tarry
to indulge us; it knows not the delight its presence
gives us, and is hastening to join its mate. She, in her
sober, modest dress of olive and brown, is no doubt as
attractive in his eyes as he is to her in all his gay
plumes of scarlet and gold.

The Indians, in their expressive language, call the
Baltimore Oriole “Fire Bird,” while the more prosaic
settlers call it “Hang Bird,” from its pendent nest, a
name more fitting to its habits, but less poetical and
descriptive of the bird itself than the Indian name.
68 - PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

The nest of the Oriole is a curious piece of workman-
ship, composed of all sorts of thready materials, picked
up in all kinds of odd places, even in busy streets where
no one would suppose so shy a bird would ever venture
to appear.

I have in my possession a wonderful specimen of an
Oriole's nest, taken from the branch of an acacia tree in
front of a dry goods store in a busy, populous town.
The nest is made of a mass of strings, pack thread,
whip cord, cotton warp and woollen yarn. All these
materials are most skilfully woven together in a regular
network, and form a large soft elastic purse-shaped
bag with a round opening in one side. The nest was
suspended from the end of the bough by strings care-
fully fastened to it, and dangling from this curious
hanging cradle is a long piece of string, to which is
attached a large somewhat rusted packing needle,
threaded, as if it had been used by the ingenious little
worker in the manufacture of the bag, and there left.
All the materials had been gathered up from the sweep-
ings of the store, collected bit by bit, but at what time
is a question unanswered.

So splendid a bird as the Baltimore Oriole picking up
rags and odds and ends in a public thoroughfare one
would think could hardly have escaped the eyes of men
and boys, if done in noon-day; but there is a hidden
wisdom. possessed by God’s little ones, and it strikes me
that the work was done, and well done, too, in the early
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 69

hours of the dawn. Before the earliest laborer was
astir, going forth to his work, this little builder was
busy at hers.

The Baltimore is not the only bird that might be
called a weaver. There are many foreign birds remark-
able for their ingenuity in such work. The little Taylor
Bird, which sews two leaves together as with a needle
and thread, is one of these wonderful bird architects.

Here at my door is another of my little friends, the
Chestnut-crowned Sparrow, of which I have already
spoken in the preceding chapter. This familiar, social
little bird is one of the earliest to make its appearance
about our homes and gardens, and is always welcome.
It is as friendly in its ways as the dear robin used to be
in the Old Country, and we reward it by treating it to
crumbs from the table and any dainty little scraps that
are at hand.

It is the very smallest of our birds—the smallest, I
think, of all the many species of the sparrow family—
and is so harmless and useful that it has many friends.
A gentle, kindly little creature, it hops confidingly about.
our pathways and on the verandas, evidently in full
eonfidence of being welcome at all times.

The name “ Chipping Sparrow,” which is often applied
to it, arises from its weak note, “Chip, chip.” Sometimes
it raises a cheerful little attempt at a song, but the effort
does not amount to much.

The reddish spot on its head is an unmistakable mark
6
70 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

of the species. Its familiar, friendly habits distinguish
this innocent little bird from any of the rest of the many
sparrows that visit us during the breeding season, and
we hail its arrival as among the earliest harbingers of
spring.
‘‘They tell us that winter, cold winter, is past,
And spring, lovely spring, is arriving at last.”

This tiny visitor comes before the swallow ventures to
try her arrowy wings in the capricious air of our April
weather. In bright sunny March days, while the snow
is yet on the ground, its pleasant little note is heard,
and it is often seen in company with the juncos, with
which it associates in a friendly manner, the, flocks
mingling together in common, picking up seeds that lie
scattered on the surface of the snow.

They are of wide distribution, being found all through
eastern North America, beyond the Roeky Mountains
westward, and even as far northerly as the Great Slave
Lake. Its nest is simply constructed of fine dried
grass, a few root fibres, cow’s hair, and maybe a feather
or two, built in some low bush near the ground. The
eggs are a pale bluish green, three or four in number.

Another welcome friend is the Canadian Robin,* as
he is commonly called; but he is only an immigrant. A
few venture to winter with us, hidden, as we suppose,
under the covert of the thick forest, but they are seldom

seen.

 

*The American Robin—Merula Migratoria (Linn.).
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 71

Though he bears the familiar name of robin, he is not
a real representative of the “household bird: with the
red stomacher,” as one-of our old divines calls the
English redbreast, yet the name seryes to recall to the
Canadian immigrant, in his far-off wilderness, the
' homely little bird that so fearlessly entered open door
or window as a familiar guest, loved and cherished by
man, woman and child alike. The little bird that hops
about their path and carols gaily at their side when
all the other songsters are silent or have-left for fairer
climes and fruitful fields, holds a warm place in every
heart.

The redbreast is held sacred; even the village boy,
when out bird-nesting in grove or field, would not touch
the nest of the sitting bird nor hurt the tiny fledglings.
How often, as a child, have I heard the Suffolk distich
from the lips of the country peasant boy :

‘‘The robin and the chitty wren
Are God Almighty’s cock and hen ”—
a rude rhyme, but spoken with reverence by the simple
lad, and good in its teaching for the harmless bird’s
safety.

The American Robin is not a true thrush, but is a
near relative to those sweet songsters, the Merle and the
Mavis. He is one of the first of our early visitants.
Before the snows of midwinter have quite melted, he
comes across the St. Lawrence at. different points, and
spreads through the country on the lodkout for a favor-
72 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

able settlement where he and his future spouse and
family may make themselves a comfortable home for
the long summer days to come.

The male birds come before the females, and in small
parties, I think, as it is usual to see four or more of
them near each other in the fields and gardens. It speaks
well for the domestic harmony of their lives, this look-
ing out for the future comfort of their partners, and a
good example for our young men to follow before taking
to themselves wives. Commend me to the wisdom of
Mister Robin.

There is great rejoicing when the bevy of young
females come over the border-land, followed by, I am
sorry to say, a good deal of fighting before matrimonial
arrangements are completed.

I rather think that our male robins help to construct
the large unsightly nest, or at any rate assist in bring-
ing the materials—sticks, roots, dried grass-stalks, straw
and other such coarse matter. The walls inside are
plastered with clay, not very neatly—in fact, it is about
as fine as a chopper’s shanty, rough and ready, but serves
its purpose as a nursery pro tem. for the young birds.

If we examine the nests of some of the smaller birds—
the finches, for instance—and notice the beauty of struc-
ture, the smoothness of finish, the symmetry of form,
the softness and delicacy of the interior—no roughness
nor hardness in the material, all loose threads tucked in
so neatly—and then think of the tools the little builders
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 73

have had to work with, well may we be filled with
admiration and astonishment.

Take the nest of the goldfinch, and then see what the
little creature has at her command. Only a tiny awl-
like bill, which must answer for knife or scissors to cut
and clip her building material; the claws on two tiny
feet, for though we do not know how she uses them, a
great deal of the work must fall to their share; a soft
rounded breast with which to mould and shape and
smooth the cup-like structure till it acquires the exact
circumference and size needed for the accommodation -
of five little eggs, and later on five little birds that are
to be fed and cared for until such time as the parents
judge they may be safely left to shift for themselves.

This nest is as perfect as if the most skilful hands
and the most delicate fingers had put the finishing
touches to it and the most critical artistic eyes had
overlooked the building—if, indeed, any human skill
could construct it, even with all the appliances of
modern knowledge.

In most instances it is the female bird who takes upon
herself the labor of building the nest. This is a labor
of love, and the bird puts forth all the energies of her
nature and all the skill with which she is inspired, to
accomplish her work well.

Having the stereotyped pattern ready, she seeks a
suitable place and lays the foundation as any builder
would do. She gathers material bit by bit, the strongest
74 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

and most substantial first. She selects or rejects this
or that, according to her plan and the order to be ob-
served—wool that the thorns and bushes have caught
from the sheep and lambs; hair that cow or horse has
let fall; grey lichens picked from a wall, and tender
green moss from a fallen tree. Taking here a bit and
there a morsel, to give strength or elasticity, needful
warmth or softness, she weaves all together according
to the family pattern. Birds are very conservative, and.
deviate very little from the ancestral form or type of
architecture.

Ah, here is one of Nature’s mysteries! Who taught
the little bird builder and upholsterer to use the same
materials, to shape her nest (possibly the very first one)
to the exact size and pattern, to line it inside just like
the one her mother and all the goldfinch family had
made centuries before she came into the world? So like
is it that no country lad seeing it would ever mistake it
for that of a robin or a blackbird or a yellow-hammer,
bearing, as it does, in its construction, the unmistakable
trade-mark of this particular little architect.

Are not these things, simple as they may appear,
worthy of our attention? May they not lead us from
the nest of the little bird and her ways to the throne
of the great All-wise God, who has implanted in His
smallest creatures a wisdom that baffles the reason of
the wisest of men to understand and explain? Truly

‘‘ There are teachings in ocean, earth and air;
The heavens the glory of God declare.”
ANOTHER MAY MORNING. 75

Did not our Lord, in whom the fulness of wisdom
dwelt, point out to His disciples lessons to be learned
from the flowers of the field and the birds of the air?
_ We learn from them perfect obedience to His will and
dependence on His care; unselfish devotion, from their
care for their offspring; perseverance, forethought and
industry, from their efforts in obtaining food for the
sustenance of their helpless family; unity of purpose,
from the gregarious birds who move in flocks actuated
by one will in their flight to distant climes; order, dis-
cipline, and obedience to their leader, as in a well-drilled
army on the march. Watch the movements of a flock
of wild-fowl on the wing to some far-away breeding
ground: there is discipline and prompt obedience, an
evident plan and controlling power. We hear not the
word of command, we know not the signals given, but
we can see there is a ruling power regulating every
change in the host, and that there are no rebels in the
army.
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED
FRIENDS.

‘* Now out of woodland copse and cover,
Dies the summer as died the spring,
And days of delight for lover and lover,
And buds that blossom and birds that sing ;
And southward over our inland seas
Have vanished the humming-bird and the bees;
Fleet on the blast the dead leaves hover;

Loud in the forest the axe-strokes ring.”
—C. P. Mulvaney.

THE PINE GROSBEAK.

AmoncG the few species of birds that linger in our cold
climate in the shelter of the pine forests and cedar
swamps, is the Pine Grosbeak (Penicola E'nucleator).
Like the Crossbill (Curvirostra) he is a brave, hardy
fellow, and of a sociable nature. He is usually met

with in parties of from five or six to eight; probably
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 77

it is the paterfumilias who leads the flock, the spring or
summer hatch.

In our winter gardens, and in groves where there are
evergreens, balsam-firs, spruce and cedars, the pine
grosbeaks may be seen busily searching for seeds and
insects, scattering showers from the dry cones they tear
asunder, it may be, for the seeds or for the hidden larvee
of the pine-destroying Buprestians with which many
species of the cone-bearing trees are infested. The larch
and spruce are destroyed by the larve of the Saw-fly,
and the spruce particularly by the Bud-moth.

The grosbeak is a handsome bird when in full
plumage. The rich cinnamon-brown, varying in shades,
of the females and young birds, though fine, is not com-
parable to the dark crimson, shaded to black, of the
older male birds. In size the full-grown birds are as
large, or nearly as large, as an English blackbird or
thrush.

The thick bill marks the family of the grosbeaks, of
which the English bullfinch also is one. This form of
the bill is very well suited to the food of the bird,
consisting as it does of hard nutty berries, juniper and
red cedar, and the seeds of the cone-bearing trees. This
seems to be more especially his winter bill-of-fare, for in
the autumn the berries of the mountain ash are eagerly

sought and evidently enjoyed.
78 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

THE SCARLET TANAGER,

The Scarlet Tanager (Pirangu Erythromelas) is.
another brilliant bird. The Indians and the old settlers.
in Canada call it the “ War Bird,” because, they say, it
was not seen on this side of Lake Ontario, nor on the
St. Lawrence, till after the close of the war between
Great Britain and the United States, in 1812-14, not
until peace was established.

The country, however, was but sparsely inhabited
before that date, and it is probable there were not many
among the settlers who would take much note of, or any
particular interest in, the coming and going of the birds.
Though much reliance cannot be placed on such tradi-
tions, yet one often chances to glean interesting facts
from them. The old settlers in the bush and the
Indians were my only sources of information about the
birds when I first came to the Colony. The natural
history of the Dominion had not then attracted the
attention of writers to any extent.

To see this now rare bird, the Scarlet Tanager, one
must go back into the lonely forest settlements, as he
does not affect the vicinity of towns and villages, but.
loves the seclusion of the quiet woods, far from the
noisy haunts of men. In the silent depths of the forest
his nest is secure from the acquisitive boy and the
prowling cat.

During my first year’s residence in the Douro back-
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 79

woods, I used to watch eagerly for the appearance of
these beautiful scarlet birds. The black feathers of the
wings and tail form a fine contrast to the bright plumage
of the neck and back. As the woods are cleared away
we lose many of our summer visitors from the other
side of the lakes.

The tanager’s nest is made of strips of bass and fine
rootlets woven together and fastened securely to a
branch where no rude winds can shake it. There they
hatch their little broods, and, as soon as the young birds
are fitted for the change, quietly depart, their dazzling
robes being no more seen glancing among the dark
shades of the forest. So peacefully do our “ war birds”
come and go.

One day, some years ago, I met an Indian with a
dead bird in his hand, which by its thick short bill I
recognized as one of the grosbeak family, but unlike
any of those birds I had before seen, the pale whitish
plumage of its breast being dashed with crimson spots,
just as if its throat had been cut and the drops of blood
had fallen in an irregular shower on the breast.

I dsked. Indian Peter the name of the bird. With the

1?

customary prologue of “Ugh!” a guttural sort of
expression, he replied, “Indian call bird ‘ cut-throat’ ;
see him breast!” thus calling my attention to the singular
red marks I had noticed, and at the same time showing
me that they were not blood-stains caused in the killing

of the bird. He was taking it to a young gentleman
80 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

who wanted it as a specimen, and who was a clever
taxidermist. ‘

I could gain no further information from Peter, nor
have I ever seen another specimen of the bird with this
descriptive name. I have, however, since found in a
lately published work, “The Birds of Ontario,” by
Thomas Mcllwraith, already quoted, that the dress of
the female grosbeak is a pale whitish-grey, and it
strikes me that this may have been a hen-bird but
partially colored, or a male bird not in full dress.

While speaking of my Indian friend Peter I recall a
little scene which took place in the post-office at Gore’s
Landing, at that time a general rendezvous for both
busy folk and idlers. As is usual in country places, the
office was also a store, and was kept by the gentleman
before alluded to as a collector of birds, ete. The Indian
hunters were his best customers, trading their furs and
game for tobacco, groceries and other necessaries.

Peter was a picturesque figure as he marched into the
store, gun'in hand, and clad in his blanket-coat and red
sash, especially as drawn through this red sash hung a
beautiful Hawk-owl.*

Everyone exclaimed, “What a beauty!” but Peter,
taking it from his sash, flung it on the counter with a
word that did not sound at all nice.

“Why, Peter!” said Major St. Q——, “ what’s the
matter ?”

 

*American Hawk-owl—Surnia Ulula.
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 81

“Ugh! Shoot no more hawk-owl, nor eagle; no
more again. He like to kill me!”

Then, becoming a little less excited, he gave the
history of his trouble in tolerably good English, for
Peter was Indian only on the mother’s side.

“T went out shoot something in woods for dinner.
No partridge, no squirrel, no hare. See mister hawk-
owl on branch in cedar-swamp—shoot him. ' Guess
William Brown here give me something good for hawk-,
owl. Stuff, you know. Pick him up, draw him through
sash,,carry him so. By and by hawk-owl, him not
‘dead, him get alive again—stick him beak and claws in
my back. By Jove, I sing out! Couldn’t get beak out
of my back-bone. I keep yell loud, till brother John he
come. Hawk he hold on. No get him let go. John he
say, ‘ Cut him’s head off” and it hard work then to get
him beak out of my back. I swear, I never shoot
hawk-owl, no, nor eagle, no more.”

Poor Peter, I do not think he quite approved at first
of the peals of laughter with which his story was
received. It certainly was very droll and greatly
diverted his unsympathetic auditors.

However, Peter was comforted by a small gift and a
plug of tobacco from the Major.

-

THE BLUEBIRD.

As the redbreast is to the British Isles, so is the blue-
bird to the Americans. It is often spoken of as
82 .PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

“ Wilson’s Bluebird,” because of that ornithologist’s -par-
tiality for it, and it is ever cherished and protected from
wanton injury. It is, however, less frequently séen
now in the inland settlements north of the great lakes
than in former years. L

Its song is soft and varied, and its lovely cerulean
blue color delights and charms the eye as it flits among
the trees in our groves and gardens.

Its nest is placed low with us and is not very care-
fully concealed—so kindly is this sweet bird treated in
its American home that it is unsuspicious of danger
when paying its summer visits to us.

Mr. MeIlwraith says that the immigrant English
sparrows are.to blame for the increasing rarity of the
bluebirds’ visits to their old haunts, and closes his
charming book with a quotation from Wilson’s lines. in
praise of his favorite bird.

THE CANADA JAY.*

TY an Indian hound intrudes into the house, his
master dismisses him with the words, “ Wis-ka-geen,”
which mean, “Get out, lazy fellow,” and the Indian
name for that bold, troublesome bird, the Canada Jay,
the pest of the lumberer’s camp in the North-West, is
very similar, “ Wis-ka-Tjan.” This the Hudson Bay

 

*The Cvnada Jay—Perisoreus Canadensis. Indian name, “ Wis-ka
Tjan "—“ Whiskey Jack.”
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 83

folks have turned into the more familiar sound of
“Whiskey John” or “ Whiskey Jack.”

This daring bird comes of a doubtful race, not very
distantly related to the jays, crows, magpies and some
other noisy and not altogether reputable characters, and
is himself a sort of freebooter, not famed for his strict
regard for the rights of mewm andtuwm. In the words
of an old Hudson Bay trapper, he is “a nateral-born
thief.”

He is, indeed, a free-and-easy sort of fellow. When
not stealing he is as full of idle mischief as a school-
boy, nor has he any beauty of appearance to make up
for his bad qualities.

My first acquaintance with these, to me, strange birds
commenced at the house of my hospitable friends, the
Stewarts, of Auburn, where I was always a welcome
guest.

On one occasion my husband and I were detained
there for two days by a very heavy snow-storm and
subsequent high winds and deep drifts.

After breakfast Mr. Stewart opened a window which
faced the river below the house, the rapid Otonabee, at
that time bounded on the opposite shore by a dense
forest.

Immediately on a signal whistle being given, a pair of
“whiskey jacks” flew across the river to the open
window. Mr. Stewart had previously placed a small
board, with one end resting on the window sill and the
84 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

other supported by the edge of the table, from which
the breakfast dishes had not yet been removed. The
board thus formed a bridge for the accommodation of the
bold pair. Up they marched, and, like the little foxes,

‘* Very soon they were both at work,
Waiting neither for knife nor fork.”

Potatoes, crumbs of bread and scraps of meat vanished
quickly ; bones were dexterously picked, nothing seemed
to come amiss, and as soon as the feast was over away
flew the “whiskey jacks,” back to the shelter of the
woods to preen their feathers as they sat on the grey
branch of an old oak tree that stretched its leafless arms
over the cold but still unfrozen waters of the river.

“These birds are as full of frolic as little children,”
said. our host ; “by and by they will be over again in
the back-yard picking up any bits they see and take a
fancy to, chasing any article that may be blowing about
in the wind and playing with it as any puppies would
do.” x

While the birds had been enjoying their breakfast
on the table, I had been taking notice of their plumage.
It was of a dusky slate-grey, loosely set and hairy, the
neck and head a shade darker, with a dirty yellowish
white ring around the neck ; there was some white, too,
on the under part of the breast and tail. The latter was
long and kept in constant motion, the bird, as he
walked, flirting it up and down with a would-be careless
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. © 85

air, which, together with the quick glancing, mischievous
expression of the eye, gave a peculiar character to his
countenance, and marked him as a bold, daring, yet sly,
unscrupulous fellow, caring for nobody but his own
audacious self.

I was so much amused by the sauciness of the pair of
North-Westers, visitors from the far-off fur country of
the Hudson Bay territories, or the northern parts of the
Rocky Mountains, that I said to our host, “ I wish these
droll birds would pay our clearing a visit.”

Mr. Stewart laughed, and said, “Ill send them up.
Look out for them.”

And, strange to say, the day after our return home, as
if the cunning fellows had heard and understood what
had passed, there they were hopping about at the back
door, wagging their tails and picking among the newly
swept snow and d¢bris in their usual free and easy style.

Of course every attention was paid to our visitors in
giving them food. They made many trips to the stable
and barnyard, and having fully satisfied their curiosity
and acquired a knowledge of the establishment, they
came to the garden and there amused themselves with a
piece of rag they had discovered somewhere about the
premises, of which they made a fine plaything. They
tore it into shreds, and carrying them to the garden
fence, hung them on the pickets, turning and twisting
them, tossing them to and fro, eyeing them from every
point of view; with head on one side and their bright

7
86S! PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

eyes twinkling as if with the very spirit of fun and
mischief.

If the “ whiskey jacks” did not enjoy their play, my
little boy did. He laughed and clapped his hands with
glee as he stood on a chair by the window and watched
their pranks.

Whether our visitors preferred the abundant and
varied fare they were accustomed to receive daily at the
hospitable table at Auburn, or whether they were only
on a visit, is a question we never solved, but they
certainly disappeared early the following morning and
returned to us no more.

Possibly our cat Nora had kept too watchful an eye
on their movements, or the great dog Nero had alarmed
them, or it may be they preferred their favorite perch
on the old oak tree by the river.

The fur trappers of the North-West regard these jays
as a great nuisance, as when pressed by hunger they
damage the furs that are suspended in their tents or
wigwams, as well as devour the jerked meat hung up
to dry.

So bold are these feathered plunderers that it is in
vain the men hurl all sorts of missiles at them; if
driven off for one minute, back they come the next and
pounce? upon the meat as audaciously as ever.

“Nor is their flesh worth eating; it is mean stuff, and
not worth powder and shot,” said my informant, who
evidently held the game in no small contempt.
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 87

THE RED-WINGED BLACKBIRD.*

These birds are abundant in Canada, especially haunt-
ing the shores of the lakes and rivers, though they are
not water birds. They live chiefly on wild rice and the
seeds of aquatic plants and insects, but are very trouble-
some to the farmer, as they make great havoc of his
grain fields.

At night they roost on the trees and among the bushes
at the borders of marshy places. About sundown they
gather in great flocks and retire to their leafy lodgings,
filling the air with the noise of their wings, chattering
and calling to each other.

They have their sentinels in the day-time to warn the
flock of approaching danger. These utter a note which
sounds like the words “Geek! geek!” often repeated.
There is also another note uttered slowly like the twang
of the string of a harp.

I used to listen for this vibrant_note and try to dis-
cover its meaning. No doubt it was a signal to its
comrades, as the flock would rise on the wing at once
upon hearing it.

The feathers on the upper part of the wing of this
bird give it the name of Red-wing. The gay shoulder-
knot, like a soldier’s epaulette, brightens and relieves
the dead black of the plumage. When on the wing
this bright spot is seen better, the light catching it as

 

* Agelaius Pheniceus (Linn.).
88 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

the birds wheel about, and giving a flash of color scarcely
visible when they are at rest.

Nearly allied to our red-shouldered blackbird is the
yellow-headed blackbird, a large handsome fellow with
the whole head and upper portion of the breast and
neck of a bright yellow.

This fine species is not common with us, but is some-
times met with in Ontario. He is the Xunthocephalus
of Bonaparte, and belongs rather to the Western States
of America; eastward he is only an occasional visitor.

THE FISH-HAWK.*

‘* The osprey sails above the Sound ;
The geese are gone, the gulls are flying ;
The herring shoals swarm thick around,
The nets are launched, the boats are plying.
Yo ho! my hearts ! let’s seek the deep,
Raise high the song and cheerily wish her,
Still as the bending net we sweep,
‘God bless the fish-hawk and the fisher.’ ”
— Wilson.

A bold fisher and a successful one is the Osprey,
second only in his power of wing and keenness of vision
to the rapacious Bald-headed Eagle, his great rival, who,
with lordly arrogance, ‘acting on the ungenerous spirit of
might overcoming right, often robs him of his lawful
prey.

However, as both these birds are thieves and tyrants,

 

*The American Osprey -Pandion Haliaétus Carolinensis.
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 89

we need not waste sympathy upon the Fish-hawk, espe-
cially as he in turn has none for the poor defenceless
water-fowl. He pounces upon them while they are
harmlessly disporting themselves on the pools of water
just opened out between the masses of floating ice in the
lake this warm April day. Happy creatures! They are
heedless of the watchful eye of their enemy hovering
above them, ready to descend with hooked beak and
sharp talons upon the fairest and plumpest of the flock.

Silly birds! Why don’t they look up instead of
enjoying their bath, or standing in groups on the edge
of the ice, preening their feathers and indulging in idle
gossip with their neighbors, or preparing themselves
for a fresh plunge in the water, a luxury so long
denied them by the rigors of winter ?

There! What a wild commotion ensues when at last
they become aware of the proximity of their enemy, as
he makes a sudden descent and bears off a duck ora
young goose in his terrible talons! How they rise en
masse on clamofous wing, and wheel and fly from his
dread presence !

Possibly he might have preferred a bass or a perch, or
a big sucker, had such a prize been more available, but
“all is fish or fowl that comes to his net,” and a delicate
duck or gosling is not to be despised; so he is content
with what he has taken, and flies off to some quieter
spot, out of sight and hearing of the noisy crew he has
outraged, to take his meal in thankfulness. The water-
90 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

fowl, meanwhile, pop down once more upon the bosom
of the lake, and are soon flirting and splashing the
sparkling water over back and wings as if no enemy
had ever disturbed them or robbed them of one of their

number.

THE BELTED KINGFISHER.*

This bird visits Ontario in April or May, and may be
seen on the banks of all the lonely lakes and rivers. It
has not the brilliant plumage of the European bird, and
is by no means as graceful in form. Its note is a very
unpleasant one, a loud quick rattling cry uttered as it
skims along the borders of lake or stream, a solitary
object seeking its sustenance from the waters, or, it
may be, procuring food for its young brood or the
mother bird on the nest.

The dusky white ring about the neck is a marked
feature in the bird. The bluish grey of the feathers is
barred with black on the wings and tail; hence its name,
“Belted Kingfisher.” It builds no nest, but the female
bird deposits her eggs in the enlarged end of a tunnel
dug in a sand-bank. ;

It stays late with us and does not seem to feel the
cold. Itis only when the frost has driven the fish to
seek shelter in the deeper waters, and the belted bird
can no longer obtain the requisite food, that he flies
south.

 

Ceryle Alcyon (Linn.).
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 91

KING BIRD.*

The habits of the King Bird are highly amusing’ to
watch. He is about the size of a blackbird, of dusky
plumage, but with a white border to his tail and some
-white in the edges of the wing feathers. His note is
very harsh and grating, and his favorite position the top
of any upright stick or bare pole, from which point of
vantage he can survey the “limit” he has chosen to
reign over. Here he sits turning his head until the
bright glancing eye lights on some unwary insect, when
he darts off and rarely misses his aim. His prey secured,
he returns to his perch and awaits another chance.

Both names given him are descriptive, the latter
apparently with good cause, if one may judge by the
enmity shown him by all the smaller birds. They show
this dislike by uniting together and making common
cause against the enemy, attacking him, not in fair fight
with beak and claws, but by keeping a certain distance
above him and darting down and striking him on the
head, then rising again swiftly to be ready to deal a
second blow. The bewildered bird, unable to defend
himself, can only flee from his tormentors and hide away
‘among the thickest evergreens, fairly beaten out of the
field.

, Union is power ; by it the weak confound the strong.
Many an instance have I seen of a similar kind, many

 

*Tyrant Flycatcher—Tyrannus.
92 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

a big crow being forced to flee before the attacks of small
birds. Even the hen-hawk or harrier has been driven
away by the united attacks of apparently insignificant
but determined parties of two, three or four brave little
creatures, whose plan was simply to keep above the head
of their enemy, and out of his reach after striking their
blows.

The swallow and martin are renowned for these feats
of bravery. They are always victors, and might, be
crowned as champions of the helpless little song-birds
who so often fall victims to the crow, the king bird and
the hawk.

THE BOHEMIAN WAX-WING.

Another noisy crew are those pretty, wild pilferers of
the garden and orchards, the cedar birds, or cherry
birds, and names common to the smaller species of
Ampelide, or Wax-wings.

The larger, handsomer and more remarkable of the
family is known as the Bohemian Wax-wing, or 4 mpelis
garrulus, and he is indeed a noisy, chattering fellow.
These are not so common as the smaller cedar birds, but
they occasionally visit us in large parties, and doubtless
receive scant welcome from the market gardener, who-
does not approve of their brigandish assaults on his
ripening cherries and other fruits. We, however, are
more tolerant, and overlook their predatory habits in

our amusement at their wild merry ways.
MORE ABOUT MY FEATHERED FRIENDS. 93

This morning there is a flock of some dozen individuals
in my garden. They are full of frolic and fun, and if
‘one may judge by the noise they are making as they
fly hither and thither from bough to bough and tree to
tree, they are having a gay time chattering and whis-
pering to one another, and one might almost say, laugh-
ing, like a party of light-hearted children at play.

One wonders what it is all about. I really think it
must be a wedding party, and a joyous one, too—a
match of which both families approve. See how impor-
tant some of the older birds look, setting up their soft-
crested heads and puffing out their breasts. As they
dart past me I catch sight of the bright scarlet orna-
ments, like bits of red sealing-wax, on the wing feathers.
_ These jewels are the distinguishing marks of the full-

grown male bird, and no doubt but the little feathered
dandy is as proud of these bits of finery as any girl is
of her brooches and bangles.

The Bohemian Wax-wing is of foreign extraction. He
is a little aristocrat, somewhat exclusive, and vain of the
family of which he is the head. He does not mix him-
self up with the common folk, but keeps religiously to
himself, for you never find him and his party with the
smaller species, the cedar birds, native to the country.

The Bohemian is a great traveller, and seems to spend
his time in visiting strange lands. He is found in many
‘countries, and it is not easy to locate his home. He and
his family do not settle down soberly, as some other
94, PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

birds do, but go where they please, stay awhile and then
disappear, and you do not meet with them again for
several seasons.

. Besides the gay ornaments of the wing, the tail
feathers are finely fringed with golden yellow, which is
seen most distinctly when the bird is on the wing

The berries of the mountain ash and the choke-cherry
(and, in winter, the fruit of the red cedar and juniper),
form the food of these birds, with what ripe fruit the
garden affords them; but if they eat the fruit they also
destroy swarms of destructive insects.

The cedar bird is accused of destroying the buds of
the apple trees, but in all probability this is a mistake.
It may be only the hidden larvee of the codlin moth, the
curculio, the beetle, or fly, that is doing the real injury,
depositing its eggs in the bud; and the cedar bird in
seeking it as his prey is doing much good service in the
orchard.

.Man in his greed is often very short-sighted in his
judgments.

I
THE ENGLISH SPARROW:
A DEFENCE.

“And He that doth the ravens feed,
Yea, providently caters for the sparrow,

Be comfort to my age.”
--Shakespeare.

HARMLESS, persecuted, despised, reviled sparrows, who
is brave enough to take your part? Who will take you
under a sheltering wing and say a word in your behalf?

I dare so to do, setting at nought the torrent of invec-
tive which is sure to fall on my defenceless head.

It was “Don’t Care, that came to the lions.” So ran
the awful warning for wilful folk that I used to pore
over with childish credulity in Doctor Fenning’s Spell-
ing Book, an ancient volume out of which I learned my
first lessons, and where villainous type, hideous pictures,
bad paper, and the use of / for s puzzled the brain and
confused the eyes of the little scholar of three years
of age.

Well, I “ don’t care” if I do come to the lions, I will
96 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

have my say about those poor sparrows, remembering
the words of the gracious Lord, “ Not one of them shall
fall on the ground without your Father.”

“Doth God take care for oxen?” saith the apostle.
Yea, He careth; yea, and for the birds of the air also.
He openeth His hand and feedeth them. Not one—not
even the sparrow, despised among thoughtless men—is -
forgotten by the great Creator,

‘‘ Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

Atoms or systems into ruin hurled,
And now a bubble burst, and now a world.”

There is a war of extermination against these birds
going on in the North-West, and among the farmers and
gardeners in country places. A regular hue-and-cry is
being raised for their destruction, and nowhere are they '
to be shown mercy.

Now, I would fain take their case in hand and en-
deavor to prove that this wholesale persecution is both
unjust and unreasonable.

In the first place, were not the birds first brought into
the country through avarice or ignorance, as a specula-
tion, by some adventurous Yankee, who “assisted” them
across the Atlantic in order to make merchandise of them?

Were they not introduced into the agricultural dis-
tricts as destroyers of the weevil, army-worm and all
other kinds of injurious insects ?

Yet it was very well known that the sparrow was a
THE ENGLISH SPARROW: A DEFENCE. 97

granivorous, and indeed an omnivorous, bird. He is not
dainty; he will take anything and everything that falls
in his way. As paterfumiliashe is a good provider for
his numerous offspring. Small blame to him! Sparrows
and their young must live, they will not starve.

Yes, the sparrows will eat grain, and the farmer says
they do eat the wheat, and therefore they must be killed.

But stop a minute. When do they eat the wheat ?
Only in the season, and that a very short one, of the
ripening grain, as it is only then that they can get it,
and when, with many other grain-eating birds, the
sparrows flock to the harvest to take their share.

* Audacious robbers!” the farmer calls them, and
straightway all the blame of his loss is laid on the immi-
grant sparrows. He forgets that the sparrows have been
cultivating the crop, too, in eating and destroying the

numerous insects that infest it while it has been in the
blade and in flower, and does not stop to consider that
the laborer is worthy of his hire. The sparrow but
takes his due for service unseen and unrecognized by
the master of the field. Then when the crop is garnered,
he is but one of the many gleaners who are busy for
awhile in picking up the fallen wheat kernels scattered
by the reapers.

The harvest and the gleaning season over, let us follow
the sparrows to the villages and towns. There are here’
no fields of ripe grain to make havoc of, no farmers to
offend, but the birds must be fed. How /
98 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Look down on your streets and thoroughfares. On
every heap of refuse, every scrap of garbage, in every
dirty gutter or dropping in the roadway, about the sweep-
ings from yard or store, are groups of these despised
birds, busy, hard-working and unpaid scavengers.

Who knows what evils they prevent, what they devour
that otherwise would become decayed vegetable matter,
decomposed and typhoid-breeding filth; the larve of
beetles and other noxious insects,’ half-digested grain
that if left would shortly breed corruption and disease
hurtful alike to man and beast.

True, the birds are bold. The sparrow takes posses-
sion of the eaves and cornices of your buildings, your
sign-boards and your window sills. Any projecting
beam or odd angle he makes his coigne of vantage
from whence to spy out what he wants. But in this he
really interferes with no one, and it is only the braggart
assurance of his manner that excites our aversion. His
ragged nests are usually hidden away in out of sight
corners or sheds, so we have not that to cite against him.

Ah! but someone comes down on me with the accu-
sation that the cruel, wicked, malicious and altogether
disreputable sparrow kills and drives away all our dear
little song-birds.

Wait a bit, my good friend. Did the other birds
never fight or attack strangers? The bill and claws of
the sparrow are not those of the Raptores. He may
be pugnacious, but so is our dear pet the redbreast.
THE ENGLISH SPARROW: A DEFENCE. 99

‘Fair fight and no favor,” say I. Fight? Yes,
they all fight at times, robin against robin, when they
are in the humor for it, and the weakest goes to the
wall.

As to the accusation that the sparrows drive away
other birds, let the other birds defend themselves. In
physical strength they are all his equals.

I cannot help thinking, however, that it is a fact yet
lacking confirmation. There is an old saying, “Give a
dog a bad name and of course he suffers for it.” It is
my impression that in this instance it is but a news-
paper scandal got up for “copy,” and endorsed by the
farmers who first introduced and then traduced the
poor sparrows; used them first to get rid of the pests
that blighted their grain, then abused them for helping
themselves to the wages begrudged them.

I have here the testimony of a very intelligent
observer of Nature, one who has carefully watched the
habits, food and peculiar ways of the sparrows in this
country as well as in England. He says: “I have never
been able to detect wheat or any other hard grain in the
crop, and it is my opinion that these birds are more
insectivorous than granivorous, and that it is the larvee
of insects that they obtain in the buds of the fruit trees
and in the ears and joints of the wheat and oats which
induces their visits to the fields; and if they pick the
husks it is not for the kernel itself, but for what is
really destroying it. The sharp pointed bill of the
100 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

sparrow is more suited for picking worms than taking
up hard grain.”

To sum up, the sparrow, an invited guest, an assisted
immigrant, was at first welcomed; then, when he had
done the work required of him, we find he has other
qualities for which we gave no contract, consequently we
would like to assist him home again or exterminate him,
as one who has out-worn his welcome.

Though he betrays no secrets, he is an eaves-dropper
of the worst description. He makes holes in our eaves,
and scatters the straw about, and is a nuisance; yet, on
the other hand, he is a good scavenger and helps to keep
the air about the house pure.

He is a bold, impertinent fellow who is always at.
hand to eat up the crumbs thrown out for his betters,
and moreover he labors under the imputation of driving
away other birds of more value in our eyes, but is known
to be possessed of no more superior powers than they
are provided with.

Thus the two heaviest counts in the indictment are :
First, the destruction of grain; second, the driving
away of the smaller and more valuable birds—both of
which indictments have been pleaded by counsel as not.
proven.

Have I made out a good case for the sparrows? I
have said my say. Iam only an old woman after all,
with a Briton’s love of fair play, so let us give the poor
sparrow a chance.
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY.

‘* What atom forms of insect life appear!
And who can follow Nature’s pencil here ?
Their wings with azure, green and purple gloss’d,
Studded with colored eyes, with gems embossed ;
Inlaid with pearl, and marked with various stains -
Of lovely crimson, through their dusky veins.”
—Anno Letitia Barbauld.

On looking over my old diary of a far-off date, 1839, I
find notes of many things that struck me in the first
years of my sojourn in my forest home-—objects that then
were new and interesting to me, but which now I seldom
or never see.

There is a change in the country: many of the plants
and birds and wild creatures, common once, have dis-
appeared entirely before the march of civilization. As
the woods which shelter them are cleared away, they
retire to the lonely forest haunts still left, where they
may remain unmolested and unseen till again driven

back by the advance of man upon the scene.

8
\
102 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

It is rarely now that I catch a passing glimpse of the
lovely plumed crossbill, or the scarlet tanager; seldom do
I hear the ery of the bobolink, or watch the sailing of
the bald-headed eagle or the fish-hawk over the lake, as
I did formerly in fear for the safety of my little goslings.
Even the gay, cheerful note of the chickadee is rarely
heard, or the sonorous rapping of the red-headed wood-
pecker, or the plaintive, oft-repeated monosyllable of the
wood phebe. .

I think these birds dislike the appearance of the red
brick houses of the modern villages and towns, with
their green blinds and fancy work in wood and paint.
Perhaps they look upon them as possible traps to cage
them, and find the old familiar rude shanty or log-house
more to their taste in architecture.

Here’ is one of my old notes made in that long ago
time on the great cat-owl :

A very solemn, formidable-looking bird is this big
long-eared owl. One was shot and brought into the
house for my inspection. It was still living, having
only been winged, and evidently was very angry with
its captor, ready to avenge itself by a blow with its
strong hooked beak and sharp talons. The glassy round
eyes were glaring ominously from beneath the swathe
of thick rich brown mottled feathers that half shaded
them from the light. The ears, or the tuft of feathers
that concealed them, stood up, giving a warrior-like
aspect to the grand, proud bird.
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 103

Who is there among the early settlers that has not
heard in the deep stillness of night, from some old oak
in the woods or out-building near the house, the deep
sonorous voice of the cat-owl calling to its mate? The
hollow notes sound like “Ho—ho—ho—ho,” repeated
with a pause between each syllable, as if to prolong the
echo.

The Indian notes of lamentation over the dead, “ Wo-
ho-ha-no-min,” seem an imitation of the mournful ery
of this night bird.

An old Irish settlef in the backwoods once gravely
assured me that the “Banshee,” the warning spirit of
death or trouble which, he said, belonged to his family
when he lived in Ireland, had followed him and his house
to Canada. I looked a little doubtful. The old man
grew angry because I asked :

“ Did she come out in the ship with you?”

“Shure an’ why should she not?” he replied. “Did
she not cry all the time me poor wife—God rest her
sowl—was in the death thraws? An’ did she not cry
the night the cow died?”

That indeed was a proof not to be doubted, so I judi-
ciously held my sceptical tongue, though I thought it
might well have been the cat-owl crying to her mate
from an old hollow tree near the shanty ; but it would
have been rank heresy to liken a real faithful family
“ Cry-by-night,” or “ Banshee ” to a cat-owl.

Later the old man in rather an aggrieved tone, ques-
104 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

tioned my faith in the “little people,” or the fairies.
When I suggested it was a long way for them to come
across the Atlantic, he took great pains to convince me
that if they caréd for the family when they lived in Ire-
land, they would not mind how long the voyage or the
distance, so that they could watch over them here. .

On the borders of the lake I see many beautiful
dragon-flies of all colors—red, blue, green, bronze, and
some rare large flies with jet-black gauzy wings.

One kind, that I have tried in vain to capture, had a
scarlet crescent mark on each lower pair of wings.
Another, not less remarkable, was distinguished by azure
blue crescents on the wings. These flies led me a chase
for some time, I was so much struck with the beauty of
the rare insects. They did not resemble the gay dragon-
flies in form or color, and I wished to obtain a specimen
to send home to a friend; but after that summer I saw
them no more, they having disappeared with the pine
woods.

There is a pretty and curious insect, one of the Sphinx
family, that comes out in the cool of the evening, and is
very busy on the mignonette and other low growing
border plants. It is very much like a bee in appearance,
and sings a low humming song as it darts from flower
to flower. Its body is longer and narrower than that of
the bee, and its colors are black and white in bands.
The lower wings of these curious moths are exceedingly
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 105

small, the upper ones long and narrow. The swiftness
of its hovering motions and the noise of its wings
remind one of the humming-bird, hence people call it
the Humming Moth.

The most beautiful of our native moths, and also the
largest, is the exquisite pale green Attacus lwna. This
classical name was given it from the moon-shaped figure
on each wing, showing the bright colors of blue and
scarlet in the centre of the eye-like spots.

The lower pair of wings are lengthened into long tails
like the school-boy’s kite, and are beautifully fringed
with a pale gold bordering. These long tails are said to
be of essential service in aiding the flight of the moth,
serving to maintain a proper balance in its passage
through the air. Several of our butterflies—as, for
example, Papilio turnus, the handsome sulphur-colored
Swallow-tail—have this form in a great degree, while in
others it is absent, as in Danuis archippus, a fine red
butterfly, one of our largest and most showy; also in
the representative of the Camberwell Beauty and some
others.

The body of the beautiful green Attucus lunu is
thickly clothed with soft silky white down. The legs,
feet and antenne are of a coppery-red color, the latter
short and finely pectinated—that is, having fine tooth-
like projections.

The scarlet and blue colors are very effective in
contrast to the exquisite tint of pale green which dis-
106 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

tinguishes this lovely moth from all others. It is very.
rarely to be seen now, but seems to love the shade
among the orchard and forest trees.

It is in the orchard that we find the cocoons of that
grand moth, the Attacus cecropia, a splendid insect,
both in size, form and rich colors; as large, when its
wings are fully expanded, as some of our smaller birds,
measuring, indeed, nearly seven inches in width.

The heavy thick body of this inseet is red, but
marked by deep rings, and the surface clothed with soft
whitish hairs. The head is large and the antenne
strongly pectinated.

The marks on the wings are in the form of half-
moons, showing a variety of shadings, with vivid blue
and some red in the centre. There are other lines and
wavy marks on the wings, besides a deep rich border
pattern.

I am afraid my very unscientific mode of description
may offend the learned entomologist. If so, I crave
pardon and plead limited knowledge as my sufficient
excuse.

The common name for this fine moth is the Apple-tree
or Orchard Moth, because its brown felted chrysalid cases
are found attached to the twigs of orchard trees.

The first really hot days cause the imprisoned insect
to burst from its sealed coffin, and its wonderful and
mysterious resurrection to light and life is at once
effected. It flutters forth a glorious but short-lived
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 107

creature, perfect in all its beauty, to soar aloft in the
sunlight and enjoy the sweet warm summer air for a
brief season—a type to man of the promised resurrection
of his own body from the dust of the earth, through the
perfect work of redeeming love in the Lord Jesus Christ.
“O Death! where is thy sting? O Grave! where is thy
victory ?”

Since the above description of the Attacus cecropia
was written, some years ago, I have had knowledge of
two varieties of this remarkably beautiful moth.

About two years ago a friend sent me from Chicago
three cocoons of this species. These cases, attached to
slender twigs, were much smaller in size than the apple-
tree variety, and were light brown and finely felted.

The moths (two came out all right, one was abortive)
were smaller in every way, but beautiful in markings
and color. They remained on a sunny window for some
days, then one died and the other disappeared.

Last Christmas I was given another cocoon, fixed to a
red-barked dog-wood spray. It was of large size and
very unlike the brown woolly cases I had hitherto seen.
It was constructed of dead leaves and a grey papery
substance like that of the wasp. There was no opening
whatever in it ; all was closely sealed up.

One sunny morning (April 21st) I was delighted
at the sight of the tenant of the grey house, a
magnificent specimen of the Attacws moth. It stood
108 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

opening and closing its wings as if for flight, but
remained for hours on the leaf of a scarlet geranium
near the window, giving me a good opportunity of
noting its beauty. Especially did I admire the rich
coloring and markings on the wide wings, which were
about six inches in extent and elegantly rounded and
lobed.

The general color or ground-work was a rich dark red
brown, with two large irregular white circular figures ;
within the larger circle was another figure semi-circular
in form and of several shaded colors. The lower pair of
wings were adorned in the same way, the edges being
more scalloped and smaller than those of the upper
wings, and beautifully marked and fringed with a
bordering of white, red and grey.

The body of the moth was short and thick, barred
with white, and having deep red spots between the lines.
The outer surface of the back, seen between the open
wings, was deep red. The legs were clothed with a
velvety red down.

As soon as the lamp was lighted, the moth spread its
wings and, bat-like, flew to the light, and would have
been seriously injured had we not come to the reseue—
not, however, before the feathery margin of the wings
was somewhat scorched. Taken out of the room it flew
about, casting a dark bat-like shadow on the ceiling.
For some days it hid itself among the window curtains,
coming out of this retreat only at night, and for the
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 109

_ past few days it has remained fixed to the corner of the
what-not in the parlor. Its wings are closed, and it has
apparently lost all its energy; the light no longer
attracts it, the fine red pectinated antenne no longer
are moved as at first—the beautiful creature is dead, or
dying.

On a minute inspection being made of the empty
cocoon, it seemed a mystery how the big, bulky insect
could have escaped from its prison. There was no
visible aperture for its exit save one small pipe terminat-
ing in a tiny orifice, through which it seemed impossible
that even the head of the creature could have issued.
Yet, this must have been its door of egress, for no other
was to be seen.

Among the myriad marvels in Nature, there are no
greater than those found in the insect world.

I was given two of the large brown cases of the
Orchard Moth last winter. I laid them aside in the
drawing-room and forgot all about them. One warm
May day, on going into the room, great was my surprise
and delight to see two beautiful creatures on the window
panes, enjoying the sunshine, and, I dare say, longing to
be out in the warm free air.

By and by they became very restless, as if bewildered
by the novelty of their surroundings, flitting about on
the gay flowers of the curtains, and finally, after several
days had elapsed, one of the two deposited sixteen gold-
110 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

colored eggs on the chintz. I make a note of the bare
fact, and leave it to be pondered over by the experienced
naturalist.

Besides the butterflies I have noticed in my old diary,
I might have named the Tortoise-shell and the two >
Admirals, the red-marked one and the white. There are
many others, too, which resemble in color and appear-
ance species I was familiar with when in England.

There are the Tiger Moths, bright, gay creatures that.
come in at night attracted by the light of the lamp; and
some large beautiful grey and rose-colored varieties with
damasked wings, which shun the glare of the light and
retreat to shaded corners of the walls out of sight.

Our beautiful oak trees are often disfigured when in
full leaf by branches of brown or withered leaves, as if
some scorching blast had fallen upon them.

I was standing on the lawn at my friends, the Hay-
wards, admiring the glossy foliage of a group of hand-
some scarlet oaks (Rubra coccinea), one of the most
beautiful of our native oaks, when my attention was
drawn to one of the branches of a fine young tree near
me which was affected by a quivering motion, while all
the rest were quite still. :

It was an intensely hot July day, not a breath of air
stirring the leaves. Suddenly the branch parted from
the tree and fell at my feet. I took it up to examine
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 111

the cause of its fall. The leaves were still green and '
fresh, but on close inspection of the severed part, which
was nearly half an inch in diameter, I found it finely
grooved, as if it had been sawed or filed by some sharp
toothed instrument.

This was evidently the work of a Sawyer or Borer,
one of the numerous species of the destructive Bupestria,
which in the larve state are so injurious to our forest
trees.

I sought diligently on the ground for the little work-
man, but while I had been examining the branch he had
hidden himself away in the grass, there to undergo the
last change to the perfect state of his kind as a small
beetle.

Being desirous of obtaining some information concern-
ing the creature and its work, I turned to the report of
the “Field Naturalists’ Society of Ottawa” for 1884
(page 49), and the following description satisfied me that
my sawyer must have been the larve of a Twig-girdler:

“ Oncideres cingulatus. When the female desires to
deposit her eggs she makes punctures in the bark of
small twigs or branches. She then girdles the branch by
gnawing a ring round it, which kills the branch, and in
course of time it breaks off from the tree and falls to
the ground, and the larvee feed on the dead wood. The
beetle is greyish brown with a broad grey band. It is
commonly known as the ‘Twig-girdler.’”

In the present instance the leaf of the branch was still
112 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

fresh and green, but at the same time I noticed the
noiseless fall of branches from the oak trees adjoining,
and saw that the ground was strewn with dead withered
boughs and sprays, while others still hung by tiny
shreds of bark, ready to fall, and disfiguring the appear-
ance of the trees.

The entomologists now employed by the Government
and attached to the Buredu of Agriculture, have of late
years turned their attention to the appearance and
habits of this class of tree-destroying insects, which are
doing so much injury to the forests and orchards of the
country.

The ravages of the various species of Scarab are not
confined to the oak and pine alone, but every species of
hardwood tree nurtures one or several kinds peculiar to
itself.

The subject is one of considerable importance, and
should not be devoid of interest even to the youngest
student of natural history. It is a study particularly
recommended to the agriculturist, horticulturist and
florist, and it would be well if there were text-books
written in simple, plain language, that would be instruc-
tive and at the same time awaken an interest in it among
our young people.

The habit of close observation inculeated and encour-
aged in children is a continual source of pleasure and
profit in after-life, often, indeed, leading to results that
are little anticipated, as in the well-known case of Sir
NOTES FROM MY OLD DIARY. 113

Isaac Newton, who had learned to see and think as a
child—results so wonderful that the less observant have
been disposed to attribute them to actual inspiration
from God. True, He implanted the seed thus nurtured in
the child, and brought forth the fruits in the man.

But I am wandering away from my subject, the ways
of those tiny insects, the twig-borers.

How marvellous and wonderful is their instinct! Note
the curious means employed to accomplish an end which
could not be foreknown by experience, by teaching or
by reasoning, in the creature working for the future
preservation of her unseen offspring. The calculating of
the exact date when it should come forth, and the
corresponding time when the girdled branch should part
from the tree, thus providing a nursery for her infant
and sufficient nutriment to sustain it, until in its turn it
arrives at the perfect state of the mother beetle, to enjoy
like her a brief term of life, prepare a cradle for its
offspring, and die.

Surely this leaves a lesson for man to ponder over
and confess that he knows but little. The wisdom of
man must be but foolishness in the sight of God, since he
cannot fathom even the ways of one of the most
insignificant of the works of the Creator. How then
can man by his puny wisdom find out God ?
TERE SPIDER.

‘“‘The spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’
palaces.” —Prov. xxx. 28.

I must confess to a natural aversion to spiders, an
aversion I cannot overcome sufficiently to avoid shrink-
ing from contact with them; yet I acknowledge that
they are more interesting to me than any other of the
insect tribe. I study their habits and ways with keener
pleasure than I do those of the industrious bee or the
active ant.

There is an individuality in the character of every
spider which, in comparing one with another and
studying the peculiarities of each, gives it additional
charm. Each spider appears to act independently of his
fellows, and often indeed of the family pattern. He is
not of a sociable nature, and though he will sometimes
allow a small brother to give him a little help, or to look
on when some large web is in hand, he more frequently
THE SPIDER. 115

carries on the work in an independent style, as if he
were saying :

“Let me alone, if you please; I want none of your
help. You only bother me and run in my way. I have
all my wits about me, my own tools and my own
materials. I can mind my own business, and want
neither your advice nor your assistance.”

He is a surly fellow, a misanthrope, and a very ugly
tempered as well as conceited one at that.

The spider certainly is accredited with possessing a
very ferocious temperament, the males often fighting
with great fury. The females, who are larger than the
males, are even more combative—indeed the ungentle
spouse is not infrequently charged with devouring her
‘own husband ! It is possible, though, that the victim
‘may have been the meddlesome proprietor of a neigh-
boring web, whose interference had aggravated her be-
yond endurance, and the act, therefore, might be termed
justifiable spidericide.

Ugly and repulsive as some spiders are, they no doubt
are as proud of their personal appearance as of their skill
in the manufacture of the delicate webs which they hang
out to lure unwary flies to their destruction, and so
supply their pantries with the dainties they love.

But, seriously, what a marvel he is, what striking
characteristics he has, what forethought, what vigilance.
How clever are his contrivances and expedients where-
with to compass his desired end. Who can have failed
116 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

to note his subtlety in concealing himself, his fierce and
jealous temper—all traits belonging to the savage, and,
alas, too often to be found among the more civilized of
the human race.

But the spider is not altogether without his good
qualities. We must do him justice, and not slay him
without mercy.

He has energy, industry and great perseverance under
difficulties. He is no idler. Instead of giving up
immediately on the first failure, he sets to work to
repair what has been destroyed or injured, not once but
several times. He is courageous, for he will not be
daunted even by a wasp or a big blustering bully of a
blow-fly, twice as strong as himself; though, and this is
hardly to be recommended as a good quality, he often
overcomes his enemy by effective cunning. He has no
pity for his victim, but casts his entangling threads
over him and binds him down securely ; then, knowing
that his cries will bring him no aid and his struggles
will but bind his bonds more closely and finally exhaust
him, the wicked spider retreats to his dark corner and
waits for the death of the unhappy prisoner.

An ugly picture! We will turn away from it now
and see if we cannot find a more pleasant side to spider
life in-the maternal instinct.

One motherly spider carries her eggs along in a
white silken bag wherever she goes, as if she were
afraid to let them out of her sight. This is a dusky
THE SPIDER. 117

brown or black spider, and her greatest merit is the
tender care she takes of her embryo, unhatched
family.

There is another species, known by Old Country
folks as the “Nursing Spider.” She also carries her
precious eggs ina fine yellow silk pouch, attached to
herself by strings. The load is so nicely balanced that
she can move quickly about without being in the least
incommoded by it.

When the tiny things are hatched they follow their
mother in a long train, each fastened to her by a silken
thread. Where she goes, they go. They are of a bright
reddish color and are very lively.

The old mother is by no means a disagreeable-looking
creature; her body is about the size of a small garden
pea, of a light yellow brown color.

It used to be a great source of amusement to me to
watch the motherly care this amiable spider took of her
numerous family when travelling over the flower borders.
If one of them lagged behind or seemed disorderly, she
came to a halt till they all assumed the regular marching
position. What the word of command was, who could
tell? But however it was given, it had the desired effect
of restoring order.

A few years ago, when camping out with a party of
friends on a picturesque and rocky island in Lovesick
Lake, while the younger members of our party were

bathing, I used to ramble along the rocky margin of the
9
118 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

lake to look for ferns, fresh water shells and other
curiosities,

One morning my eye was attracted by a ball of
yellowish silk hanging in the middle of a soft maple
bush, growing in the clefts of a fissure in the limestone
rock.

The ball was about the size of a pigeon’s egg, and was
held in its place by a number of strong lines. On touch-
ing one of these with my finger, out rushed some dozens
of small spiders, and from the bottom of the bush, to
which several of the threads were attached, came a large
black spider of formidable appearance and unusual
fierceness of aspect.

Up she hurried to the rescue of her brood, examining
the nest and lines with great care. Finding nothing
injured in the cradle-bed and its fastenings, she ordered
the frightened little ones back to their nest, and as soon
as she saw them safely housed, retired slowly to her
post at the foot of the bush. This time, however, she
took the precaution to place herself facing the ball and
its contents, that she might the better keep a vigilant
outlook for the enemy.

I confess that curiosity tempted me to renew the
attack just to see what the mother would do, so I again
touched one of the strings. The vibration was communi-
cated to the mother as the little spiders again ran out,
which instantly had the effect of bringing her up to their
help. ;
THE SPIDER. 119

How carefully she again sought to discover the cause
of the trouble, her angry countenance showing manifest
displeasure at the annoyance I had caused.

Upon nearer observation I perceived that a thread was
attached to each one of the little creatures, and this.
again to the centre of the web, so that when they ran
out they formed a circle, and the movement caused a

connecting thread or threads to convey the intelligence
to the mother below.

I could not but admire the care and wonder at the
marvellous instinct of maternity implanted as strongly
in this little insect’s breast as it is in that of any human
mother. Truly instinct has been beautifully defined as
“God’s gift to the weak.”

There is a small, nimble species of field spider, with
a black shining body, that is very numerous in rocky
pastures.

Having first prepared a bed of some glutinous sub-
stance, she spreads it in a thin plate less in size than a
three-cent piece. On this the eggs are deposited in due
order, and over them is laid with great care and neatness
a circular cover or lid which is made to fit as exactly as a
pastry-cook would cover a mince pie or oyster patty.

So artistically is our little spider pie finished, and the
edges brought together so exactly, that one would think
it had been pared evenly with a sharp knife and pressed
closely to prevent prying eyes from discovering the
baby spiders tucked in so carefully.
120 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

My little boy used to call them “little silver pies.”
Great was the astonishment of the child one day, when
on raising the edge of one of these little cases out ran at
least a dozen tiny black spiders.

What became of the family thus turned out of house
and home I do not know, but I fear they came toa sad
end. Jamie did not inherit his mother’s aversion to
spiders, and the uncertainty attending the fate of the
“little dears” his curiosity had turned out into the cold,
caused the heart of the infant naturalist much concern.
PROSPECTING, AND WHAT I FOUND
IN MY DIGGING.

‘* All that glisters is not gold.”

—Merchant of Venice.
ONE day last summer I was digging in the grove outside
my garden for some fine black mould with which to pot
some geraniums. While poking about with my spade
at the roots of a decayed old stump, and stirring the
surface of the loose earth and leaves, a glittering object
caught my eye. .

It was so bright that I really began to fancy that I
had hit upon a treasure, perhaps a nugget, but when I
continued to prospect for my gold, to my surprise it
began to move, and presently a jet black creature, with
coat like grained leather, decked with bright golden
stars, came slowly struggling into view.

It was evidently of the lizard family, but unlike any
specimen I had ever before met with. It was not a true

lizard, as I found out later.
122 PEARLS AND PEBBLES. z

In length, from nose to the end of the tail, it was
about ten inches. The back was marked with nine gold
stars ; there were also three on either side, three on each
leg, one on each foot, and one on the head, which was
flattish, and one on the nose,—altogether a very hand-
some set of ornaments shining with yellow lustre on its
jet black coat.

Knowing the inoffensive nature of the creature, and
that it would neither bite nor sting, I transferred it to
my flower pot and carried it home that I might study it
more at my leisure.

I have before alluded to my dislike for spiders and
reptiles of all kinds, arising from an aversion to any-
thing ugly or disgusting, and although this little
creature was more remarkable for its handsome appear-
ance than any of its kind, I still preferred looking at it
to touching it, and was surprised at a young lady friend
not only taking my lizard in her hand, but actually
petting and patting it without the least reluctance or
aversion.

My friend was, I found, quite a naturalist. She told
me that she had seen a specimen of the same in Nova
Scotia, where the species, though rare, was well known:
She thought it belonged to a division of the Bactrian
order, and that there were some eighty species native to
North America, and many southward; possibly it
belonged to the genus Sulamandria maculatu, or
Spotted Salamander family.
x

WHAT I FOUND IN MY DIGGING. 123

After we had studied it to our hearts’ content, and
admired and counted its spots, it was consigned to a
glass preserve jar half filled with water, and left in peace.
Our prisoner did not, however, appear to be enjoying the
bath as much as we expected he would, but on the
contrary was evidently desirous of escaping the liquid
element, raising his head and forefeet above the surface
and looking anxiously through the transparent wall of
his prison with rather a doleful expression of coun-
tenance.

He certainly was not happy, and I, having some com-
passion for poor “Gold Star” in his captive state, deter-
mined to release him. After a confinement of two days
I opened the jar and took him back to his home under
the stump in the grove. The released animal walked off
very leisurely, but no doubt enjoyed the sense of liberty,
which may be as dear to a salamander as to man.

Some time afterwards I was describing my capture
to a gentleman who was much interested in the natural
history of Ontario. He said it was a true salamander,
belonging to the order Urodela, family Salamandrie ;
that he had often seen both the spotted and gold-starred
species in the forests of southern France, where they
abound. Like all the tribe they are great insect
devourers, and having no evil propensities are never
destroyed by the country people.

When on the Continent, Mr. E—— was a great
frequenter of the woods, seeking for specimens of birds
124 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

and insects, and would often stay his steps to watch and
admire the beauty of the glittering coats and the lively
movements of these little creatures as they darted to
and fro or basked in the sunshine.

They are great lovers of heat, and it is from this no
doubt the idea arose that the salamander could live
unhurt by fire. This was a mistake of the ancients, or
it may have been simply an exaggeration in alluding to
the habits of the sun-loving animal.

Mr. E thought this species was rare in eastern
Canada, but might be found farther westward.

 
THE ROBIN AND THE MIRROR.

YESTERDAY I noticed from my window a pair of robins
paying many visits to a maple tree at the edge of the
lawn. Much time was spent in flitting to and fro, but
there seemed to be no settled plan between the pair
whether to build in the upper or lower branches, and no
foundation was laid.

To-day the male bird made his appearance without
his mate, and he seemed restless and uneasy.

Now it happened that an accident had broken the’
glass in front of the Wardian case appropriated to my
ferns, and the servant had lifted it on the grass plot for
a new light to be put in. The back of the case had been
fitted with a plate of looking-glass, and as Master Robin.
flitted past he saw his own image in the glass and
instantly flew to it, evidently with joy, thinking he
recognized his absent and, I fear, faithless mate. Ruffling
his feathers, spreading his wings, and ‘pecking at the
glass as if to invite her in the most loving manner to his
126 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

breast, but finding his entreaties fruitless, he flew up to
the maple—I suppose with the hope that the wife would
respond to his call-note and follow. Then down again
the poor fellow came to renew his vain entreaties. More
than half an hour was thus spent in and out of the case,
up and down from the tree.

At last, having made a final dash at the glass, he went
off in a fit of rage or of astonishment at the behaviour of
his most obdurate spouse. Like some men and women,
Rob had taken the semblance for reality and been
deceived.

A more touching and somewhat similar incident was
one I witnessed when travelling in the country some
years ago.

In the room into which I was shown by the mistress
of the hotel was a large mirror, and while standing
before it I noticed the strange behaviour of a pretty
canary bird, which hovered with an impatient fluttering
motion over my head; but on my moving away the
little bird flew to the glass uttering a peculiar cry, and
then a thrilling song was followed by the creature flying
to the empty cage and back again to where its own pretty
image was reflected in the glass, and which it evidently
took for its mate.

On my remarking upon the strange actions of the
canary, the mistress of the house told me that its mate
had died, and that the poor widowed bird had never
ceased its mourning. She had let it out of the cage
THE ROBIN AND THE MIRROR. 127

because it was so unhappy, and seeing its own image
had taken it for the dead mate.

“Indeed, madam,” she said, “the creature is for all
the world like us in its grief; it makes my own heart
sad to see it take on so. I do not know what to do, for
I love the little thing and fear it will destroy itself
beating its breast on the glass.”

I advised her to put it in the cage and cover it over
so as to darken it awhile, or to take it out of the room
where the mirror was, which I think she did.

In neither of these cases can we well refer the actions
of the birds to the law of instinct alone
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS.

SPRING.

‘« Tf thou art worn and hard beset
With sorrows that thou wouldst forget,
If thou wouldst read a lesson that will keep
Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep,
Go to the woods and hills !—no tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.”
—Longfellow.

AT no season of the year are the woods more attractive
than in the early spring, when, weary of their snowy
covering, we hail with increasing satisfaction the break-
ing forth of the tender leafage as it bursts from the
brown buds which had encased it during the long months
of frost and winter snows.

No newly hatched butterfly expanding its crumpled
wings to the glad sunshine is more alive to the genial
influence of sun and breeze than are the young opening
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 129

leaves of the maple, poplar, beech and birch, as they
greet the soft winds of April and May, and flutter forth
into full free life. The very bark on the twigs takes a
living freshness of tint and color, in place of the dull
hard deadness of its winter hue.

In April the sap rises in the dark thready foliage of
the pines, and the heavy boughs of the hemlock and
spruce, those faithful hardy evergreens of the forest,
brightening the sombre growth of former seasons with a
rich full tender verdure, harbinger of the brighter tints
of later trees.

Then the American larch—the tamarac of the Indians
—hbegins to put forth her light green leaves and hang
out her rosy tassels of red buds all along the slender
pendent branches. Beautiful as flowers are these soft
red cones peeping out from the clusters of delicate
thready leaves which guard them, and forming delight-
ful contrasts to the deeper shades of the surrounding
foliage.

It is the tough, elastic roots of the tamarac that are
chiefly used by the Indians in making their birch-bark
canoes. This is the “wah-tap,” which, after it has been
stripped from the yellow bark, and. steeped for many
hours in water to render it more supple, is coiled away
ready for use.

The graceful tassels, or “catkins,” as they are com-
monly called, of the willow and the birch, which have
been growing in secret all through last autumn, are
130 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

among the first buds of the hardwood forest trees to
unfold, and are now “dancing in breezy mirth” on every
little spray. The least breath of wind sets them in
motion, tossing them to and fro as though the whole tree
were quivering with the joy of its new life.

Near by, but with less lively aspect, the stately elm
shows its olive-tinted, furry flower-buds in soft contrast
to the pointed, shining red cases that enclose the foliage
and fruitage of its neighbor, the graceful beech.

The first of all to give the tender color of spring to the
distant woods are the quivering aspen and the silvery
poplar. The trees on the outer edge of the forest, and
within ‘readier reach of the sun’s rays, drink in their
warmth and are the first to send out responsive life in
opening bud and leaf, an earnest of all that is to follow
when the fresh verdure shall clothe every bush and tree
with its robe of life and beauty.

Then as the snow melts, the first forest flowers appear,
the earliest to greet us being the Liver-leaf, or “Snow
Flower,” as the old settlers have appropriately named the
Hepatica triloba. The sweetest of our spring flowers, it
takes the place to us of the dear English primrose. The
starry blossoms are pure white, and blue, and pink of
several tints. They spring up all wrapped in silken
sheen from the sheltering beds of the old leaves that
have clung to them, as if to guard the hidden life from
the bitter frosts of the lingering winter.
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 131

Then comes Spring Beauty, the Claytonia Virginica,

‘* That delicate forest flower,
With scented breath, and look so like a smile,
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould,
An emanation of the indwelling Life.”

—Bryant.

Hosts of violets of all shades follow, and are among
the earliest of the forest flowers; but, alas, the ruthless
advance of man upon the scene, in cutting down the
sheltering trees, has robbed the spring flowers of the
warm winter cloak which protected them from the bitter
winds, so that while formerly we looked for these lovely
flowers in April, we now seldom tind them before May.
Some indeed of the forest plants have disappeared and
we see them no more. Types are they of the native
race, the Indian children of the land, fast passing away.
“Thou ‘shalt seek them in the morning, and shalt not
find them.”

SUMMER.

‘* Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me,
And turn his merry note
Unto the sweet bird’s throat,
Come hither, come hither, come hither :
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.”
—As You Like It.

But it is no rough weather that we shall meet this
1382 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

lovely summer day if my reader will go with me into
the forest glades.

Here is a pathway under the maples and beeches ; let
us follow it and see the woods in all their rich summer
array. The June rains and July heat have deepened
and strengthened their coloring and given matured life
and vigor to leaf and branch, so that we shall find a
richer though perhaps more subdued beauty of form
and color than that of the tender loveliness of the
spring.

Overhead the light semi-transparent leaves are all
astir, quivering in the breeze as the sunshine comes
fitfully down through the tree-tops and casts moving
shadows on the dark mould below.

Looking around us we mark the endless variety of
graceful forms in tree and leaf and flower. The earth is
teeming with luxuriance, and one might almost fancy
her conscious of all the wealth of vegetable treasures |
she bears on her capacious breast, and which she has
brought forth and nourished.

Besides the lofty maples, oaks, beeches, elms and
birches, there is the leafy basswood (American lime),
scenting the air with the fragrance of its creamy
blossoms, and, farther on, the subtle almond-like scent
of the black cherry betrays its presence among the trees ;
though but for its scent we should not have distinguished
it from among its loftier compeers of the wood.

Is it the gummy odor of the sweet birch that is so
[IN THE CANADIAN WOODs.

pleasant or is it the sweet scent of those lovely pyrolas
that some of the country folks misname “lilies of the
valley,” but which the more learned botanist classes
with the Heath family, although the affinity to the
heather is not apparent to the unlearned lover of wild
flowers of the forest ?

Among the less important forest trees, the bloom of
the horn-beam attracts the eye, and truly no flower can
hang more gracefully from its pendent spray than do
these pretty greenish white sacs, resembling strongly the

-hup which one sees twining its tendrils about the lattice
of many a poor settler's veranda in the backwoods,
where it is cultivated alike for ornament and use.

The rough furry cases of the beechnuts are now
giving an olive hue to the branches, and a darker, more
sombre color to the light green foliage which so charmed
us in the first flush of spring. There is on their laden
branches the promise of an abundant supply for many
of God’s pensioners, the squirrel, the field-mouse, the
groundhog, the porcupine, and others of the roving
denizens of the woods and wilds. These creatures know
well the time of the dropping of the glossy three-sided
nuts, and hasten diligently to gather up their stores.
They gather that they did not toil for or sow, but their
bountiful Father openeth His hand and filleth all things
living with plenteousness.

How deep is the silence of the forest! A strange

sweet sense of restful stillness seems to come down upon
10
134 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

the soul. One scarcely cares to tread too roughly, for it
is as if the shadow of the mighty God of all creation
were around us calling for an unspoken prayer of praise
and adoration.

We stand beneath the pines and enter the grand
pillared aisles with a feeling of mute reverence ; these
stately trunks bearing their plumed heads so high above
us seem a meet roofing for His temple who reared them
to His praise. ‘“ Where is the house that ye build unto
me? .. . Hath not my hand made all these things?”

And hark! through the aérial harp-strings, swept by
the sighing winds, are there not hymns of melody and
praise unheard by human ears that ascend up on high
even to His throne? “O ye winds of God, praise Him
and magnify His name forever ! ” ,

There are melodies in ocean, earth and air, unheeded
by man as he goes forth to his daily labor, but heard by
unseen spirits in their ministrations of love fulfilling the -
will of our Father.

Not many living creatures cross our path in these
leafy solitudes, unless by chance we disturb some red
squirrel from his seat on a moss-covered fallen trunk.
At our approach he darts up the nearest tree in swift
gyrations, for these little creatures climb in circles, first
on one side then on the other. The eye can scarcely
follow his track until he reaches a. projecting fork where
he finds a hiding-place ; there, made bolder by distance,
he stops to look down, perhaps not in fear but with
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 135

curiosity and something of displeasure, upon the unwel-
come intruder. He expresses his anger by uttering
sharp scolding notes, i up his fine furry tail as a
banner of defiance.

Listen to that soft whispering sound. It cannot be
called a song. it is so soft and monotonous. It is the
note of a tiny brown bird that flits among the pine
cones, one of the little tree-creepers, a Sitta or a
Certhia, gentle birds small as the tiniest of our wrens.

They live among the cone-bearing evergreens, glean-
ing their daily meal from between the chinks of the
rugged bark where they find the larvee upon which
they feed.

As they flit to and fro they utter this little call-note
to their companions, so soft that it would pass unnoticed
‘but for the silence that reigns around us.

We call this little denizen of the pine forest the
“Whisperer,” and I have some doubt if I am right in sup-
posing it to be a Certhia or a Sitta. I cannot recognize
it in Mr. MclIlwraith’s “ Birds of Ontario.’ I know it
only as a tiny brown tree-creeper, that runs up and down
the trees uttering its soft whispering note. It is smaller
and less pretty than the tiny black and white spotted
woodpecker that comes to the trees in my garden or taps
with its strong bill on the shingled roof of the house—
a quick, noisy rapping, as much as to say, “Here J am!

1?

—here Iam!” Or perhaps I see a pair of these pretty

fellows busy on the moss-crusted garden fence. So busy
136 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

are they that they will let one come within a few feet of
them before they dart off to the nearest tree or post.
One kind is striped, with a red spot on its head; the
larger ones are more spotted.

Though there is less luxuriance in the herbage grow-

ing beneath the pines than under the maples and
beeches, we yet find some rare and lovely plants flourish-
ing there that are not found in the richer soil under the
hardwood trees.

Many of the little evergreens known by the familiar
and descriptive name of wintergreens abound, especially
the beautiful starry-flowered pyrolas.

Here is one, the Pipsissewa or “Rheumatism Weed”
of the herbalist, with the glossy shining leaves and
lovely wax-like pink flowers. It is a floral gem. Mark
its rosy stem, its dark green serrated leaves and umbel
of pink-tinted flowers. Within the hollow of each petal
we see the stamens and amethyst-colored anthers sur-
rounding the thick-ribbed, turban-shaped stigma in the
centre of emerald green. Who can look upon this
exquisite flower without a feeling of pleasure? It
seems to me perfect in all its parts.

There are many others of this family growing in the
woods, but they generally prefer the richer soil under
the hardwood trees, where also they can get more
moisture.

Of these the Moneses uniflora is one of the most
beautiful. It has but one pure milk-white blossom, each
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 137

petal elegantly scalloped, and sending forth a delicious
perfume. The pistil of the Moneses is most singular. It
is much longer than the closely appressed stamens, and
terminates in a little bright green pointed crown some-
what inclining downward. This plant is rare.

There is another small species less fragrant, the flower
of which is greenish white and inferior in beauty to the
milk white and larger plants.

Where the ground inclines to be rocky, or in the
vicinity of water, we come upon a bed of sweet May
flower. It is rather late this year. May and June are
its months for blooming, but some will linger in shady
damp spots, even on into July and August.

‘* Sweet flowers that linger ere they fade,
Whose last are sweetest.”

What a gummy fragrance about this charming plant
with the pink bells, red stems and oval leaves! It is in
the mossy glands of the stalks and buds that the aroma
lies and is given out from this beautiful Creeping
Arbutus, for it belongs to that charming ornamental
family. It would be a desirable addition to the trailing
plants of our rockeries and hanging baskets could we
prevail upon it to abide with us, but it loves too well its
own wild rocky forest haunts, and the piny soil its
rootlets find in the crevices between the stones, to
readily change its habits.

Creeping over little hillocks in shady ground we see
138 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

that kindly little evergreen, the dark round-leafed
Partridge Berry (Mitchella repens), with its fragrant
starry white blossoms, and at the foot of that old hem-
lock spruce there is a cluster of orchids, the handsome
striped or coral-rooted orchids.

These showy flowers come up destitute of green
leaves, but with many stems, some more than a foot in
height and loaded with flowers of a pale fawn color,
striped with deep crimson. Silvery scales take the
place of leaf and bract, and there are often from ten to
twenty or thirty flowers on the scaly stems, a mass of
fine color growing closely together. The irregular
white-knobbed root stalk has given it the name of
Coral Root (Corallorhiza multiflora). "

There are other species of the orchid family dispersed
among the pines, though it is generally in boggy or
peaty soil these rare and singular plants are found. Yet
here is a near connection—and one often found in the
pine woods, where we notice it growing on the decaying
trunk of some fallen tree—the pearly-flowered Rattle-
snake Plantain (Goodyera repens). Its deep green
leaves, with the milk-white traceries over their surface
and the semi-transparent sac-lipped little flower, surely
make it deserving of a better name, and one more in
keeping with its near neighbor and relative, the Ladies’
Tresses, so-called from the spiral arrangement of its leaves
and stalks.

But the slanting sunbeams gilding the red trunks of
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 139

the pines warn me it is time to retrace my steps, and
the sound of the jangling cow-bells speaks audibly of the
hour when the children will be looking for their tea.

AUTUMN,

‘* See how the great old furest vies
With all the glories of the skies,
In streaks without a name ;
And leagues on leagues of scarlet spires,
And temples lit with crimson fires,
And palaces of flame !
And domes on domes that gleam afar,
Through many a gold and crimson bar
With azure overhead ;
While forts, with towers on towers arise,
As if they meant to scale the skies,
With banners bloody red.”
—Alexander McLucilun.

, Silently but surely the summer with all its wealth of
flower has left us, though we still have a few of its
latest blossoms lingering on into the ripened glory of
the autumn days. Our roadsides and waste places are
brilliant with the gay waving Golden Rod (Solidago)—
that sun-loving flower which does not fade and droop its
golden spikes under the August and September heat.

Graceful asters, too, of many sorts are blooming in sun-
shine and in shade, and many a beautiful gentian, both
the fringed-flower of the poet and the later variety,
have I gathered late in October.

August suns have ripened the grain, and the harvest
140 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

moon has set over the fields now ready for the plough,
where the sower will soon be abroad scattering the seed
for another year.

God’s silent workers have not been idle. They have
gathered in the harvest on plain and wayside wastes, on
lonely lake shore and by the banks of the gliding river. ,
The dormouse and the ground squirrel (our little
striped chipmunk), and the red and black squirrel have
already begun to lay by stores of kernels, seeds and
grain. The musquash, the otter and the beaver may
delay yet a little till the frosty nights warn them that
“time and tide wait for no man,” nor yet for the wild
creatures that build by forest, lake and stream.

The brown acorns, glossy and shining, now fall with
every wind that shakes the branches. The rugged
husks of the beech have opened wide to let the bright
three-sided mast fall to the earth to be gathered up by
“the wild flock that never need a fold.”

Truly, it is wonderfully strange, yet true, that each
one knows exactly how much it will require to keep its
family during the winter months. Here is a calculation
that defies many a thrifty human housekeeper. He that
gathers much hath nothing over, and he that gathers
little hath no lack.

The pines are strewing the ground with a soft carpet of
spiny needle-like leaves, the product of former seasons,
and already, early in September, a few brilliant scarlet
leaves have appeared among the green of the maples,
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 141

while the birch and poplar hang out their golden
banners, soon to scatter them abroad. Not less attrac-
tive are the young beeches as seen against the full dark
green of the spruce and hemlock.

On the outskirts of the wood, or on the bank of lake
or stream, the eye is caught by fringes of every hue,
the red of the osier beds, the high bush cranberry with
its purplish tinge of foliage and rich crimson fruit,
while the glorious scarlet of the prinos, or “ winter
berry,” like the holly of the motherland, charms us by
its gay fruitage. The old settlers call this fine shrub—
for it does not attain to the dignity of a tree—the
“ Pigeon Berry.”

I know a rocky island in Stony Lake, not far from
our own little island of Minnewawa, where there is a
splendid bush laden with the berries and dark shining
leaves ; a lovely object it appeared reflected on the still
bosom of the lake that bright September morning.
What a feast for the wild birds! One almost envied
them their treat.

The juniper and. the red cedar, too, are very beautiful ;
the mealy whiteness of the one and the blue tints of the
clustering berries of the other are now in perfection,
ready for the little hoarders of the fruits of the
wilderness.

Of all the seasons in Canada, that of September is the
most enjoyable. Heat we have for a short time, but not
overpowering. The summer indeed is gone, but there is
142 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

a dreamy softness, a fulness and finish, if I may so
express it, that is very near perfection. This is the
pause before the equinoctial gales come to rend the
trees and strew the earth with a rich covering of leaves,
ere the Frost King has with his nipping fingers touched
the oak, the maple, the elm and the beech, changing
their green leaves to every shade of crimson, scarlet,
orange, yellow, and russet brown. These colors, as the
days steal by, light up the landscape with a passing
‘ glory—a glory that has with it a sense of sadness, too,
for it is the beauty that heralds in decay—Nature’s
fever glow on the cheek of the dying year.

An English artist, accustomed to study the more sober
hues of the foliage in the woods and hedgerows of his
own country, gazed with almost despairing eyes upon
one of our glowing autumnal landscapes. Striking his
hands together, he exclaimed : “ Those contrasts of color
are too brilliant! Those cloudless skies, that deep blue
water, those gorgeous scarlets, orange and reds—how
can such a scene as this be rendered faithfully as a
truthful picture of Canadian scenery ? ‘ What exagger-
ation!’ would be the verdict. How can I tone it all
down to be believed in? Yet how surpassingly beauti-
ful it is!” ,

But the lovely pageantry soon disappears. A day of
pouring rain, a sweeping wind or night of frost, and
the glory has departed, and we may write upon it,
“ Ichabod,” while the breeze sounds its requiem in wails

4
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 143

and sobs among the leafiess boughs, or shivers with
rustling sound the leaves still clinging to the young
beeches and oak saplings in the forest.

There is a change in the climate since the time when
we used to look for the Indian summer. The destruc-
tion of the forest trees has told upon it in many ways.
We feel it in the sweep of the wind in autumn and
spring especially, in the drifting snow of winter, and
in the growing scarcity of the fish in our lakes.

Those soft calm days of November or late October are
now seldom experienced—the frosty nights, misty
mornings, and warm days when the sun, veiled by the
smoky atmosphere, looked red and strange, yet not
inspiring fear—day after day of changeless calm which
the natives call Indian summer, claiming it as if it of
right belonged tothem. “ Our summer,” they say ; “ the
month of our harvest of rice, the hunter’s month, the
fisher’s month "—thus they call the last three months of
the year. But with the forests the Indians and their
Summer are both passing away.

My sister’s lines on the Indian Summer may well be

quoted here :

‘* By the purple haze that lies
On the distant rocky height,
By the deep blue of the skies,
By the smoky amber light
Through the forest arches streaming,
Where Nature on her throne sits dreaming,
And the sun is scarcely gleaming
Through the cloudlets, snowy white,—
144 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Winter’s lovely herald greets us
Ere the ice-crowned tyrant meets us.

‘*This dreary Indian summer day
Attunes the soul to tender sadness ;
We love—but joy not in the ray ;
It is not summer’s fervid gladness,
But a melancholy glory
Hovering softly round decay,—
Like swan that sings her own sad story
Ere she floats in death away.”
—Susanna Moodie.

WINTER.

‘« Sharp is the frost, the Northern Light
Flickers and shoots its streamers bright ;
Snowdrifts cumber the untracked road,

Bends the pine with its heavy load.”
—Francis Rye.

There is silence in the forest. The birds that came
to make their summer sojourn here have long since for-
saken us. All are gone—not a song, not a twitter or
chirp, meets the ear. Even the lively little ground
squirrel has gathered in his stores and retired to his
warm, cosy house under the root of oak or beech, where,
within reach of his well-filled granary, he is snugly
cuddled with his furry family, a happy denizen of his
native woods. The bolder, hardier red squirrel is safely
housed in the fork of a hollow tree, sheltered from blus-
tering wintry winds and drifting snow. The racoon, the

porcupine, the little field-mouse, are all hidden in nest or
{IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 145

burrow, and even the bears with their cubs are sleeping
in their secret haunts.

Few indeed of the hardier birds that winter with us
are now seen to venture from the close coverts of the
dense cedar swamps; only on chance sunny days the
crossbill, the pine grosbeak or the hardy blue jay will
come near our dwellings, and the little spotted wood-
pecker be heard upon the trunk of some neighboring
monarch of the forest tapping and rapping as busy as
a bee.

The hunter and the lumberman may sometimes catch
sight of the little tree creeper and the titmouse flitting
among the pines in search of the insects hidden in the
bark and cones, or hear the rapid sonorous strokes of
the large woodpecker,—the red-capped “cock of the
woods "—hammering away on some old tree and strip-
ping down great sheets of bark from the fast decaying
trunk ; but only in the thickest of the forest would this
be, for rarely is this large species met with elsewhere.

The ruffed grouse that is commonly called “wood
partridge” is not migratory; both it and the spruce
partridge abide the winter hidden in the spruce and
hemlock woods. All through the cold months of the
Canadian season they feed on the scanty berries of the
wintergreen, the buds of spruce, and the red bark of the
wild raspberry. The latter imparts a red tinge and
much bitterness to the flesh, and by the month of
February renders it unfit for food.
146 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

The Frost King is abroad, and as by the magic touch
of an enchanter’s wand has wrought a wondrous change
within the forest as well as on lake and stream.

What has become of the unsightly heaps of brush-
wood, the débris of fallen rotting leaves, of stalks of
withered flowers and rank herbage, the blackened
stumps, the old prostrate wind-blown trees? Where
are they now? Here is purity without a sign of decay.
All that offended the sight in our forest walks has
vanished.

A spotless robe of dazzling whiteness, soft and bright
as the swan’s downy breast, is spread over all that was
unsightly. The new-fallen snow decks every fan-like
spray of hemlock, balsam, fir, and spruce, with mimic
wreaths of fairy flowers. The young saplings, weak
and slender, bend beneath their burden, lightly as it
seems to lie upon them, weighing them down until they
touch the ground, forming bowers and graceful arcades
of crystal brightness; even the very stumps are dressed
with turbans whiter than the far-famed looms of Decca
could weave or art of fuller whiten.

Looking upward we see a hazy veil above the dark
funereal pine tops, through which the silvery stars gleam
softly, while fantastic shadows checker the glittering
snow beneath our feet. All about us is a stillness so
profound that it would seem as if Nature herself lay
wrapped in sleep.

The dull creaking of our footsteps on the closely
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 147

packed snow, the fall of a dry pine cone, or the cracking
of the frost-bound bark of some distant forest tree, alone
breaks the silence. Is there no sound or sight of living
thing? Yes; see those tiny marks upon the surface of
the snow— footprints so sinall that but for the long line
reaching from tree to tree they would escape the quick-
est sight. Some living thing has been here. It is the
tiniest of all quadrupeds, the little “jumping mouse,” or
zerboa. A brave little animal, fearless of cold and frozen
snow, it has ventured from its domicile in search of food.
It would not come out just for play in the cold moon-
light. One cannot suspect the fairy creature of any such
motive; but motive it must have, and it keeps it to itself.
Well is it if no midnight owl or the white arctic hawk
which is sometimes seen in the dense forest does not
‘pounce upon its defenceless head and bear it off as a
prize. I have seen these pretty little mice in the sum-
mer, and admired their agile, skipping ways; but in the
winter, though seeing many a track of their fairy feet
on the snow, I have never observed the little creatures
themselves.

In an old diary I have notes, written years ago, of
sleigh drives in a rude vehicle, when, wrapped in buffalo
and bear skins, lying at ease with my little ones cuddled
up fro the keen wintry cold, we made many a moon-
light visit to some friend. What a merry, noisy party
we were, singing and laughing and chattering as we
148 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

sped through the snow-laden forest road—a rough road
and a wild one it was then, more than fifty years ago.

What changes the years have brought! Where now
are the pine woods? Where the log-house, the primeval
settlement house; the disfiguring stump in the newly-
cleared fallows; the ugly snake-like rail fences, the rude
enclosures of the first efforts of the immigrant; the jang-
ling sound of the cattle bells, the lumber sleighs? All
are gone—things that were, not things that are.

Fair dwellings, tasteful gardens, fruitful orchards, the
village school-house, the church spire, the busy factory,
the iron-girdered bridge, the steamboat, the railroad, the
telegraph, the t2lephone—these have taken the place of
the lonely forest settlements.

“Qld things are passed away; behold, all things are
become new.” Slowly and surely the march of civiliza-
tion has gone on, yet “seed time and harvest, summer
and winter” have returned according to their circuits ;
and as I look back through the long vista of the past I
can trace the guiding hand of Him who changeth not.

A SONG FOR A SLEIGH DRIVE.
Tune: ‘Farewell to Glen Owen.”—Welsh air.

Hurrah for the forest! the dark pine wood forest !_.
The sleigh bells are jingling with musical chimes ;
The woods still are ringing
As gayly we’re singing—
Oh, merry it is in the cold winter time.
4

/
IN THE CANADIAN WOODS. 149

Hurrah for the forest! the dark pine wood forest!

With the moon stealing down on the cold frozen snow.
With eyes beaming brightly, :
And hearts beating lightly,

Through the wild forest by moonlight we go.

‘
Hurrah for the forest! the dim ancient forest!
Where silence and stillness for ages have been.
We'll rouse the grim bear,
And the wolf from his lair,
And the deer shall start up from the thick cedar screen.

Oh, wail for the forest! the green shady forest!
No longer its depths may the hunter explore ;
For the bright golden grain
Shall wave o’er the plain.
Oh, wail for the,forest, its glories are o’er!
THE FIRST DEATH IN THE
CLEARING.*

“¢ There is no flock, however watched and tended,
But one dead lamb is there!
There is no fireside, howsoe’er defended,
But has one vacant chair.”

—Longfellow.

OnE lovely morning, early in April, I was standing at
the window that overlooked the lake and its, dark-
fringed shore, watching the wild-fowl that were gath-
ered in flocks about the pools of blue water where the
warm sunshine had melted the ice. My little boy was
in my arms evidently enjoying the lively movements of
the birds as they dashed and splashed the water over
themselves. There were wild geese, ducks and herons,
and above them hovered a big bald-headed eagle ready
to swoop down upon any luckless fowl that he might
mark for his prey.

 

*From my Journal, April 6th, 1834.
THE FIRST DEATH IN THE CLEARING. 151

I was so interested in the scene that I did not hear
the step of a barefooted child behind me until a little
figure, wrapped in a faded tartan shawl, laid her hand
upon my arm and in a strong Scotch accent said:

“ Mistress, ye maun come awa’ the noo wi’ me to see
the wee ane. The mither is aye greeting and sent me
ower to bid ye come to see till’t.”

“ And who is it that sent you?” I asked.

“The mither o’ the sick wean, Mrs. P
Falls.”

“ But,” I said, “ my little maid, what can I do for the
sick child ?”

“T dinna ken, but ye maun come.”

 

, at the

Though from Maggie’s further description of the
state of the babe I feared I could do little for the
sufferer, I thought I might do somewhat to comfort the
poor young mother, so I put on my plaid and hood and
followed my little guide.

“ She stayed not for brake and stopped not for stone,”
but led the way fearlessly over the most impracticable-
looking places, sometimes climbing over log heaps, dash-
ing through puddles of melting snow, creeping along
fallen, half-rotted logs beside pools where even the little
will-o’-the-wisp was not sure of a safe passage, and
often stretching out a strong red fist to aid me when I
faltered on the way. 3

At last the house was reached without accident, and I
found the young mother sorrowfully regarding the sick
152 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

infant. It was lying in a rude cradle, pale as death,

wasted almost to a shadow, and exhausted from its last

fit of convulsions. I had seen it in her arms only a

week before a picture of infantile health and beauty, for

‘indeed it was a lovely babe. Though so young, its

pretty head was thick with curls; now lax and damp

they hung round the brow on which death had already °
set its seal. Poor Jessie! poor mother !

“Jt cannot live,” she said mournfully, looking up in
my face as if to ask for some word to give her a ray of
hope. Alas! she saw I could give her none. The Lord
of life alone could restore that fading flower, for “ Life’s
young wings were fluttering for their flight.”

We put the baby into a warm bath to try and stay
the attacks, but in vain; every half hour fresh fits con-
vulsed the tender frame, each one threatening to be the
last effort of expiring life.

It was saddening to see the intense anguish of the
mother as she stopped from the work she was compelled
to attend to (cooking for the mill hands) to bend over
her dying babe, suppressing the grief that none but a
mother can feel. I could help her only by holding the
child in my lap or watching beside it.

Jessie’s husband was the overseer of the busy work-
men employed at the buildings then being erected at the
mills, and the wife had to cook for all the men. The
master was young and had little sympathy for the poor
young mother. What was a babe of the overseer’s to
THE FIRST DEATH IN THE CLEARING. 153

him! The ready meals for the men must not be
neglected, and she must attend to and fulfil her cove-
nanted duties, babe or no babe. His hard heart was not
softened by the sight of the poor mother’s yearning, tear-
ful eyes as she turned them so sadly on her dying child;
but some of the more sympathetic among the men tried
to cheer her by saying the child might yet recover, and
though they knew the hope was not to be realized, it
was kindly spoken.

As night drew on I knew the child must die, and as I
had not the heart to leave the poor mother alone with
her great sorrow, I despatched a messenger to my own
house to say I should not be home till morning. I
prevailed on Jessie to lie down on her bed while I kept
vigil, and glad I was to see the weary heart at rest after
the day of toil and grief.

The infant slept, too, its last sleep on earth, to waken
to a new life in heaven.

The first grey streaks of morning light found me
still a watcher. The frosty air blew bleak and chill
through the chinks in the imperfect wooden walls of the
barrack-like building. Carefully replacing my sleeping
charge in the cradle, I opened the door and went forth
to look upon the face of the earth and the heavens, for
my eyes were weary and my heart was sad.

Truly a lovely sight it was that met my view. The
frosted ground was gemmed with countless mimic stars,
glittering beneath as brightly as the stars in the blue
154 PEARLS AND PEBBLES,

sky above were gleaming ere they paled before the
saffron light of the dawning day now streaking the
eastern horizon. The mist was rising in clouds from the
river where the rapids were tossing their white-crested
heads beneath the shadows of the pines that clothed the
opposite shores, grand and beautiful, untouched by the
hand of man. What a contrast to the confusion spread
around the recently erected mill and the half-finished, |
unsightly buildings, where heaps of refuse, piles of chips

and bark strewed the ground!

No one was awake or stirring—not a sound was heard
save the wild rushing sweep of the restless river as it
dashed over its rocky bed, unchecked in its downward
course by mill-dams or saw-logs, its clear waters
unpolluted by sawdust or bark, nor ploughed and stirred
by steamboats and the rafts and cribs of the lumbermen.

I turned once more to the contemplation of human
suffering. Without all was joy and life; within was
sorrow and death.

I found Jessie awake and watching by the cradle of
her little one, her hopes risen with the new day. The
babe lay still and sleeping, and she thought it might yet
recover. Knowing that I was needed at home by my
own little one, and leaving Jessie with a promise to
return, I set out on my solitary walk.

The day was now fairly opened. The ground was
hard and crisp, and though keen, the fresh air of the
early morning refreshed and revived me.
THE FIRST,DEATH IN THE CLEARING. 155

Nature herself had as it were been enjoying perfect
rest, and with the sun had awakened to a newness of
life. The living creatures were lifting up their voices
in hymns of praise and thanksgiving to Him from whom
all blessings flow, whose goodness had protected them
through the night, and whose bounty was still to pre-
serve them through the coming day.

There were songs and twitterings from birds rarely
heard in the full glare of day. The red squirrels were
out and abroad, crossing my path, while the little
chipmunk stopped and set up his furry tail and chat-
tered as if he would inquire what business I had out
among his haunts at that early hour in the morning,

The robins had just arrived in the clearing, and it was
a treat to hear the full song they poured forth. The
rapping of the woodpecker and sharp shrill note of the
blue jay jarred on my ear as I listened for the soft
whispering of the little brown certhia or the livelier
trill of the wren.

All these sweet sounds came with a soothing influence
to my spirit, and in after years the memories of them
come back to the mind wearied with the toil and moil of
life, like the psalms and hymns we learned as children,
to refresh us and lead us back from earth to heaven.

That evening I went back to the Falls to find the
poor mother overwhelmed with grief. The child had
died in that last sleep. It was her first-born treasure,
and her grief was sore. I did my best to comfort her,
156 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

although I had not then known the pang of a bereaved
mother's heart. God gave me that trial in after years.
I could only mingle my tears with hers, and even that
human sympathy was something to the grieving heart.
Once she looked down upon her arm and cried, “ It used
to lie here, and I shall never feel it here sae near to my
ain heart again.”

Jessie never forgot that babe; it lay very near to her
warm motherly heart long after it had been forgotten
by everyone but her.

The next day was the Sabbath, and the child’s funeral
was to take place at: noon. The door being open I
entered the darkened room without knocking. I shall
never forget the feeling of solemn awe that came over
me as I crossed the threshold from the bright noonday
sunshine into the hushed gloom of the house of
mourning.

There was no funeral pomp or display, no outward
demonstration. <A table in the centre of the room was
covered with a damask cloth of snowy whiteness ; beside
‘it sat the child’s father, a grave respectable Scotchman,
in black, his hat craped and tied with the white ribbon
symbol of the youth and innocence of the dead babe-
A large Bible lay before him. He just raised his head
from the book as my shadow fell upon the page, and
bowed reverently and in silence as I passed over to
where the mother bent above the little coffin.

I see her now in her black dress, her fair hair, like a
THE FIRST DEATH IN THE CLEARING. 157

golden veil gemmed with tears, almost shrouding, the
calm sweet face of her dead. There was no violence
in the subdued grief of the mourner. She took a little
packet from her breast, and opening its folds pointed to
the bright silken curls that she had cut from the pretty
head, ther replaced it with a.sigh in the bosom where
the soft head had been so tenderly nestled. It was only
when the bearers came in and closed the coffin lid that
forever hid her darling from her sight that, with a
burst of grief not to be suppressed, she threw herself
into my arms and wailed the piteous cry, “Gone! gone!
My wean! my wean!”

Then she besought me to join the little funeral proces-
gion to the burying-ground across the river, but this I
could not do, for the way was far and I did not feel
equal to the long walk.

I watched them as they crossed the bridge and
ascended the opposite bank, till the white pall was lost
among the dark'pines that marked the forest road, and
then with heavy heart retraced my steps to my own

home.
THE EARLY BLEST.
(Lines by my sister, Agnes Strickland.)

Thy mother’s sad eyes in wild anguish wept o’er thee,
And the tears of a father flowed fast to deplore thee ;
And thine own feeble cries told the struggle within,
When thou, sinless babe, paid the forfeit of sin.
158 ; PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

There was speechless despair when life’s last rose had faded,
And thy death-darkened eyes with their cold lids were shaded,
And thy young limbs were wrapped in the robes of the dead,
And forever consigned to their lone narrow bed.

They mourned for the hope that affection had cherished ;
They saw it in dust, and they deemed it had perished ;
But they knew not that mercy directed the blow

That laid their belovéd and beautiful low.

Like the blossom that’s plucked ere rude winds have profaned it,,
Or the snow-wreath that melts ere the soil has distained it,

Thou wert snatched from a world of corruption and strife,

And saved from the cares and temptations of life.

They heard not the summons, exultingly given,

Which called thee from earth and its conflicts to heaven ;
They saw not the prospects which brightened around thee
When the cold hand of death in its fetters had bound thee :
They heard not the joy-notes triumphant and clear

Which angels exultingly poured on thy ear:

‘* Heir of mortal sin and pain,

Thou hast ’scaped each earthly stain.
Child of sorrow, care, and woe,

Grief and care thou ne’er wilt know ;
Life’s dark page can never be,
Happy babe, unrolled to thee :

Tears can never dim that eye
Brightening now with ecstasy !

‘* Child, whom Jesus died to save,
Wake and triumph o’er the grave !
Cast its gloomy thralls aside :
Thou art freed and justified !
Death hath touched, but could not slay—
Heir of glory, come away!
THE FIRST DEATH IN THE CLEARING. 159

‘* Leave the sable bier and shroud,
Mount the morning’s golden cloud ;
Come through realms of azure space !
Come to thine appointed place !
Thou wert purchased with a price ;
Thou shalt enter Paradise.

‘*Come through sunbright fields of air,
Ever shining, ever fair ;
Come where blesséd spirits dwell ;
Come to joys ineffable ; y
Come through boundless fields of space ;
Come to thine appointed place.

‘Come where heavenward souls are winging ;
Come where angel harps are ringing ;
Come where seraphs eyer cry,
‘Glory be to God on high !’
Come where shining cherubim
Pour the everlasting hymn.
Thou shalt join that radiant train ;
Thou wilt swell their raptured strain.

‘*Come, thou highly favored one !
Come before thy Maker’s throne ;
Come where guilt can never sever ;
Come and praise the Lord forever.”
ALONE IN THE FOREST.

THE first impetus that our neighborhood received was
the putting up of a saw-mill at the Falls of the Otonabee,
about half a mile below my brother’s house, and the
building of a bridge to connect the townships ‘of Douro
and Smith, thus giving a better access ta the town of
Peterborough, then (1833) the only market for our
produce and for the purchase of household necessaries.

The clack of the mill wheels was soon mingling with
the sound of the rush of the rapids, and we were able
to obtain the requisite lumber to complete the new log-
house, and subsequently to build a frame barn and
stable for the cattle.

The proprietor of the mill was an adventurous young
Scotchman, very ambitious and sanguine, but who
illustrated the truth of the Italian proverb, “ His beak
is longer than his wings.”

He went home on speculation for a wife, and succeeded
in persuading a young lady who had some money to
ie

ALONE IN THE FOREST. 161

accept him and return with him to Canada. “Accustomed
‘to the enjoyment of all the comforts which independent
means enabled her to command in the Old World, it was
little wonder that the young wife beheld with dismay the
homeliness of her new surroundings in the backwoods.

She had felt the fatigue of a journey through the
sombre pine forest, and turned with deep disgust from
the unsightly prospect of half-cleared fields, disfigured
by charred stumps and surrounded by scorched and
blackened trees, in the midst of which lay her new
home. :

Where was the charming rural village her husband
had spoken of with pride and delight? Here was only
a saw-mill—never a pleasant sight—heaps of newly-
sawn boards, all the débris of bark and chips, and the
skeleton frames of unfinished buildings scattered with-
out order over the rough ground. The stone house to
which she was introduced as her future residence con-
sisted simply of two rooms on the ground floor and two
small bedrooms above, with a kitchen, a wide barrack-
like lean-to built of boards against the main edifice.

Is it to be wondered that a feeling of disappointment
and discontent took possession of her, and that, unable
to see the future with her husband’s sanguine, hopeful
eyes, she should often weep and sigh over her lot; that
she should feel the change from her former life, and that
the remembrance of all she had lost in her own beloved
country should make the contrast more painful ?
162 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Yet, though very miserable at times, she clung with
passionate affection to her husband. With womanly
devotion she made all sorts of excuses for him; she
would not, could not, believe that he had willingly
deceived her or had married her from interested motives.
This love, as it grew stronger, upheld her in the sad
reality of utter ruin, for truly misfortune like an armed
force came soon upon them, and every fair and flattering
prospect vanished. Unable to command the money to

‘meet the claims of importunate creditors, or to satisfy the
workmen clamoring at his door daily for their wages,
her husband was obliged to give up under a sheriff’s war-
rant all the property he possessed, and to find himself a
prisoner in his own house. Only on Sundays was he
free to go abroad. No entreaties availed to obtain any
portion of the principal of his wife’s property, and it
was fortunate for them that it was so vested in the
hands of trustees as to be beyond the reach of any claim
from the creditors, as the interest on it alone kept the
unfortunate debtors from starvation.

With these trials and privations came a courage and
strength of mind to do and to bear. The young wife
had no former experience of hardships, but when
encountered she bore them bravely. She was now a
mother, and the unwonted cares: of maternity were
added to other arduous duties. She often lamented
over her want of knowledge in the management of her
baby; she had never been accustomed to see young
ALONE IN THE FOREST. 163

‘children otherwise than in the nursery of a friend,
under the care of nurses, and tending on an infant was
an entirely new experience, which troubled her much.

To add to her, labors ague attacked her husband, and
to a young active man confinement to his bedroom or
‘to the house was, no doubt, very trying. To do him:
justice, he was always kind and considerate to his wife,
and, when not suffering under the effects of the ague,
took much of the care of the babe upon himself.

One by one my poor friend parted with her jewelry
and her rick silks and satins, in order to raise the means
-of defraying the wages of a servant to perform such
‘Services as she was totally unused to and unfitted for.
She was fond of flowers, but finding it useless to try and
cultivate them in the rough stony ground about her
house, she gave it up and was content with the few I
could give her from my garden.

She came often to see me to ask advice about the
baby, or for milk or other necessaries when in need of
them. She knew that I took a kindly interest in her,
‘and that she was always sure of sympathy and my
-husband’s help if required in any difficulty. He pitied
the misfortunes of her husband, and felt for them both
in their trials. ‘

A longer interval than usual having elapsed without
.a visit from my friend, and fearing that she, too, had
fallen a victim to the ague, I walked over to ascertain
‘the cause of her long absence. I found her lying on
164 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

the rude couch which her ingenuity and resource had
manufactured to supply the place of the furniture seized
by the sheriff’s officers. She looked very pale, and her
beautiful fair hair hung all dishevelled about her neck
and shoulders, as if she were too weary to gather it up.

I expressed my fear that she had taken the ague or
lake fever, but she said, “No, it is only fatigue, not
illness ; for do you know, I was out wandering, lost for
awhile in the woods last night.”

“On what errand?” I asked in surprise, for I knew
she rarely left the clearing.

“JT had reason to expect letters from Scotland,” she
replied, “and I could trust no one about the place to go
for them—indeed the business could only be done by
myself—so leaving my boy with his father and the
servant, I set off to walk to the town, with my good
old dog Nelson for company and protection. I got my
letters all right, made such purchases as were needed,
and with my bundle was preparing to return—for the
day was advancing to dusk—but Nelson was missing.
I went to every place I had been to during the day
without finding him, and, weary and anxious, I was
obliged to turn my steps homeward alone.

' “The moon was young, and I feared the light would
fail me before I could make my way through the dark
forest. You know what a cowardly dread I have of
wolves and bears, and I do not love these lonely, gloomy
woods.
ALONE IN THE FOREST. 165

“T pushed on for the first hour as fast as I was able
to walk. I was really tired, and my mind was harassed
about leaving the dog behind me. I thought, too, of
my sick husband and my boy, so that I did not dare to
linger or stop to rest.

“My mind was so full of anxious thoughts that the
way appeared more dreary; everything was so silent
aad death-like that my own footsteps startled me as they
fell upon the fallen leaves; even the cracking of the dry
sticks on the path wakened foolish nervous fears. So
absorbed was I by these needless terrors that I did not
notice at first that I had reached a point where two
paths met and branched off in opposite directions, and I
became sorely perplexed as to which was the right one
to follow.

“ After I had advanced for some time on the one I had
chosen, my mind misgave me, and I hastily retraced my
steps, not satisfied that I had taken the right path, and,
unfortunately, decided upon following the other, which
proved to be the wrong one. I hurried on, hoping to
make up for the time I had lost by my indecision.

“The increasing gloom, deepened by a growth of
hemlocks and cedars, made me think that I was drawing
near to the river and should soon find the bridge and
the mill. Still, I could not recognize some of the big
pines that I had marked in my walk in the morning.

“My heart thrilled with terror as I heard the long-

drawn howl of what I thought was a wolf in the cedar
12
166 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

swamp that I had entered; the path, too, grew narrower
and darker.

“My first impulse, when I heard that terrible sound,
was to turn and flee for my life, but all my strength
failed me at once, and I was compelled to sit down on
the trunk of a fallen tree to recover myself. I remember
crying out aloud, ‘Alone, lost! lost in these dreadful
woods, to perish by the fangs of wolves. What, what
shall I do? Lord, save me, a poor lone wanderer! O
my God, help me!’ Such, dear friend, was my agonized
prayer as I sat there in the dark forest.

“Then came the rapid sound of some animal rushing
toward me at full speed, crashing the dry branches as it.
came. I felt that to escape was impossible, and started
to my feet, while the wild beating of my heart was so
loud that I heard no other sound.

“ You may judge of the relief I experienced when my
dear dog, my faithful Nelson, bounded towards me
almost as panting and breathless as his terror-stricken
mistress.

“You know I do not often indulge in tears, even when
overwhelmed with trouble, but in this instance I fairly
cried—but it was for joy—and I lifted up my heart in
fervent thankfulness to Him who in His mercy and pity
had guided my dumb protector through the tangled
bush to my side that night. I could not help saying,
‘Come, dear old Nelson, you have made a man of me!
I shall fear neither wolf nor bear while I have you
ALONE IN THE FOREST. 167

beside me.’ (Nelson was a powerful Newfoundland dog,
and as brave as a lion.)

“TI fastened my bundle about his neck, and he trotted
beside me, proud of the burden of which my arms had
become very weary.

“T thought I would return and try the track I
followed first, but noticing that there was a clearing of
the trees ahead of me, I pushed on, thinking I was not
far from some lumberer’s shanty or the log-house of one
of the Irish settlers. Nor was I mistaken, for a few
minutes brought me to the edge of a newly chopped
fallow, and I heard the barking of a dog, which I had
mistaken for the cry of a wolf.

“The moon had set, and I judged it must be getting
late into the night. I peeped through the curtainless
window of the shanty. The glimmering light from a
few burning brands on the hearth and the smouldering
red embers of a huge back log in the wide, clay-built
chimney showed me the interior of the rude cabin.

“The inmates were all sleeping soundly. The growl-
ing of the cur as he retreated in fear of my big dog had
failed to rouse them, so I took French leave and stepped
in without further ceremony than a light tap with my
hand on the door.

“On a rude bed in the recess formed between the log
walls and the chimney lay two women. One, the elder,
not undressed, was lying on the coverlet, while the
younger with fever-flushed cheeks lay restlessly tossing
on the bed beside her.
168 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

“It was with some difficulty that I managed to rouse
the elder woman to a consciousness of my presence and
make her understand that I wanted a guide to the mill.

“*Och! och! me dear craythure,’ she exclaimed, as
she raised herself on her brawny elbow and gazed at me
from under a mass of tangled locks, a curious look in
her black eyes; ‘what for should a young thing like
yerself be doin’ up an’ abroad at sich a time o’ night.
Shure an’ it must be near the mornin’’

“*My good woman,’ I said, ‘I have lost my way in
the bush coming from the town, and I want some person
to show me the way to the mill at the Falls.’

«“«Shure, thin, she said, ‘an’ it’s no time to be axin’
tired men or the bhyes to be lavin’ their beds, but sit
ye down an’ I'll speak to me man yonder. And point-
ing to another couch, where three boys of different ages
were sleeping beside their father, she got up.

“After some discussion between them the master
agreed to send one of ,the boys, as soon as it was light,
to guide me to the Falls.

“«There, misthress,’ he said,‘ ye may jist make yerself
aisy now, an’ lie down on the bed by my gal; she has
the ague an’ the fever, but she’s as quiet as a lamb an’
will not disturb ye.’

“This was kind enough, but I preferred sitting before
the fire on a block of wood, that served in lieu of a
stool, to sharing the sick girl’s bed or partaking of a
meal of fried pork and potatoes which the woman
ALONE IN THE FOREST. 169

offered to prepare for me. Then the couple left me to
my own cogitations and the companionship of my dog
Nelson.

“The one feeling uppermost in my mind was thank-
fulness for my present safety and shelter, rude as it was.
The ‘very novelty of the situation almost amused me ;
then graver thoughts arose as I looked about on the
smoke-stained wall and unbarked rafters from which
grey mosses and cobwebs hung in fanciful drapery above
my head. I thought of my former home in Scotland, of
my old life of pride and luxury, of my Canadian home.
What a strange contrast did it present to my mind at
that moment, the red flashing light of the blazing wood-
fire, now burning fiercely, illumining every corner of the
rude dwelling and showing the faces of the sleepers in
their lowly beds.

“Close beside me lay the poor sick girl, whose fevered
cheek and labored breathing excited my compassion, for
what comfort could there be for either body or mind on
that hard bed and among those rude surroundings. The
chinkings (so I hear the people call those wedges of wood
between the logs) had fallen out in many places, and the
intervals had been stuffed with straw, old rags, Moss
and other rubbish, to keep out the cold wind. Anyone
might have known from what country the inmates of
the shanty came, even without hearing the brogue of
the south of Ireland in their speech.

“Few and simple were the articles of household use.
170 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Two or three shelves made of unplaned boards held a
few crockery cups and cracked saucers, some tin plates
and mugs, and a battered tin teapot, minus a handle; a
frying-pan with a long handle, an iron pot and a bake-
kettle seemed to comprise all the cooking utensils.

“There was a barrel of flour and another of pork, an
Irish spade which gleamed brightly beside an axe, a hoe
and a gun, the last supported by two wooden pegs
driven into the log wall.

“While I leaned my back against the sick girl’s bed
and thus occupied myself in making an inventory of the
furnishings of the house, I fell fast asleep. So weary
was I that I slept on till daylight, when I was roused
by the rolling over of one of the logs on the hearth.

“Looking up, I was startled by the sight of mine host,
whose keen, black eyes were bent on me with, as I
thought, a sinister, inquisitive look, such that I shrunk
affrighted from before him.

“Tn good truth, a more courageous person than I am
might have been justified in feeling afraid had she
been in a similar position, utterly helpless and alone.
But my fear soon subsided, and I thought it was wisest
to affect a courage that I hardly felt and to show perfect.
confidence, so I said with as cheerful an air as I could
assume,

“*You caught me napping, sir.’

“T remember the time in the days of my romance-
reading that I would have fancied myself quite a heroine
ALONE IN THE FOREST. 171

and turned my honest old Irishman into a brigand; but
my intercourse with the Irish immigrants has taught
me that there is little cause for fearing them, and my
husband tells me that their wild passions are chiefly
roused by insult to their country or their religion, or
when excited by spirituous liquor, and that such an act
as robbing or murdering the stranger who seeks shelter
under their roof is unheard of in Canada.

“The old man’s frank, good-humored manner and
pressing hospitality soon reassured me, and I would not
have hesitated to take him as my guide through the
lonely woods. He told me, however, that his boy Mike
knew every step of the road, and he could trust him to
take care of me and he'd ‘be proud to do it.’

“The good woman soon bestirred herself to get break-
fast, and I was hungry enough to take a share in the
‘praties and pork’ and to drink a cup of tea, though
there was only maple sugar to sweeten it and no milk
to soften its harshness; but I had become used in my
own home to privations in food and many common
comforts, as you well know.

“One by one the three ragged urchins came stealing
shyly from their bed ready dressed for the day, and I
verily believe their garments did duty instead of bed-
clothes. The boys, Mike, Patrick and Jonas, had all the
same smoke-dried skins, grey eyes and black hair, with
a certain shrewd expression in their faces that one often
sees in the Irish cabins. They cast furtive glances of
172 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

wonder at the strange lady, but no one ventured to
make a remark at my appearance; they bestowed all.
their attention upon Nelson, coaxing him into friendship
by giving him bits of meat and bread, which no doubt
were very acceptable to the hungry dog.

“T gave the woman a piece of silver, which she
protested against receiving but accepted after a little
persuasion, and, escorted by Michael, reached home
thoroughly tired but very glad to find all well, though
anxious at my delay.

“ Now I am resting, and I fear I have tired you with
the long account of my adventure, of which I can only
say, ‘ All’s well that ends well. ”
ON THE ISLAND OF MINNEWAWA.

It was a lovely summer day in July, 1893, when we took
possession of Minnewawa, our island in Stony Lake.
The little platform that had done duty as wharf the
year before had floated from its moorings, but a strong
hand soon helped to replace it and to put me on the
level ground above the rocky shores. A little out of
breath from the climb, I sat down on the steps of the
veranda surrounding the house to rest and enjoy the
beauty of the prospect.

The lake, with its wild wooded rocky shores and its
many islands, lay before me. The latter were of all
forms and sizes, from the tiny islet that was no more
than a half-hidden rock against which the wavelets
lifted themselves and broke softly, almost caressingly, to
the large tree-clad island, with deeply-indented bays and
overhanging vine-covered rocks. There were rugged,
darkly furrowed masses of rock, without foliage save a
few tufts of juniper, their sides covered with grey
174 ° PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

lichens, those pioneers of vegetation, giving them a time-
worn, hoary appearance. One after another they
stretched away, until Mount Julien rose like a crown
upon the mainland beyond. i

With pleasure I contemplated the varied beauties of
wood and rock, island and forest-bounded lake, and to
' the eastward the red rocky crest of Kagle Mount. How
I longed to revel in those fields of mosses that are fed
and kept ever green by its many springs, and which
carpet in mosaic-like patches the surface of the gneiss
rock.

It was indeed a lovely place, and I congratulated my
daughter on her choice of the site for our little cottage.

Everything was new, clean and fresh within the little
domicile, and all without wild and picturesque—rocks,
trees, hill and valley, wild-flowers, ferns, shrubs and
moss, and the pure, sweet scent of the pines over all,
breathing health and strength.

If I were a doctor’ I would send my patients to live
in a shanty under the pines.

Our house is a small one. On one side a branching
oak, with its dark shining leaves, nearly covers the roof,
on the other a tall pine and an oak shade the veranda.

The island rises in the centre, and to the south is
thickly wooded with many noble trees. The shores are
steep and precipitous. A deep channel on one side
divides the higher and main portion of the island from
the lofty wooded mounds to the eastward.
ON THE ISLAND OF MINNEWAWA. 175

At high water, in the spring, this gully must be over-
flowed from end to end, but just now it is quite dry and
is strewn with the débris of fallen trees. The ground
rises again beyond, but so abruptly rugged and steep
that I look at it and fear even by the aid of hands and
knees it would be inaccessible to the most adventurous
climber. A bold promontory terminates the island on
the north, a dangerous, precipitous place, but tempting
one with the grand views it commands.

A tiny tenant had taken up its abode over the door-
way of the house, where a patch of dark-green moss
first attracted my attention ; then, with a hasty flutter
of wings, a pretty little mother bird popped down from
it and sought safety on a stump among the pile of dark
rocks in the hollow below the steps of the veranda.

I am not quite sure if the bird was a wood phcebe
or not. The back and wing coverings were a dark slate ;
‘the head black, with some white about the breast; the
legs dark and slender. Her nest was very neat and
compact, made entirely of one sort of moss, and coated
inside with mud. The eggs in it were. small, round,
whitish and speckled. The nearest description to it that
I can find in Mr. McIlwraith’s book is that of the Gnat-
catcher, but I do not feel quite satisfied that my little
lodger over the door was one of that family.

It was very watchful and timid, yet bold to defend
its nest, never ceasing to flit to and fro till it saw me
moving away, when it darted back to the nest, and
176 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

would not leave it, though in returning I passed through
jthe doorway below the sill where it rested. I do not.
think it was a tree-creeper, the legs were too long and
slender; yet it seemed to cling to the stump when it.
lighted there, though without the backward movement
peculiar to the tree-creeper.

The little bird seemed very solitary, as I saw no mate,
and one day while we were away the wary little mother
took the opportunity of carrying off her brood. The
nest was empty and the birds flown when we returned,
and though we sought among the rocks and bushes we
found no trace of them.

These birds are evidently fond of such shelters as:
sheds and under roofs, for in the old kitchen I found
another nest of the same make and materials, but.
deserted, and at Fairy Lake Lodge there was another
neat new one of the same round deep pattern. Later,
when staying at Fair Havens, the summer retreat of
another of my daughters, I noticed a lively family of the
same little bird associating with the little brown certhia

“and small downy woodpeckers. There was a company
of four or five of these pretty birds, and they were so
tame and fearless that they would alight from the over-
hanging branches of a pine tree that shadowed the
platform of rock on which the house was built, and come
down almost to my feet to take the crumbs I scattered
for them. Then having enjoyed the feast, they retired
to the tree to watch and wait for a fresh supply, readily
ON THE ISLAND OF MINNEWAWA. 177

sharing it with the other little birds, with whom they
seemed on the best of social terms.

There were sweet warbling notes, low and tender,
uttered among them, but which were the musical birds
of the flock I could not discover.

Blue harebells grow in the crevices of the rocks, and
when in the canoe my companions are ever ready to
indulge my covetous desires and to paddle close into the
shore and climb the rocks to gather me the treasures.

How often in years long gone by have I gathered the
lovely blue-bell from among the heather, both in Eng-
land and Scotland! How different the soil in which it
flourishes here to the dry black sand of the heath-lands
there, yet the flowers seem just the same. Although I
knew the species to be that of the Cumpanula rvtundi-
folia, I had often questioned the correctness of the
descriptive name, the root leaves being so little seen; but
here they were all right, though withered. I had the
whole plant—root, stem and flowers—and saw that the
leaves were, or had been, round or rounded, so the botan-
ists were right, and the flower deserved the specific’
name. Though faded, the foliage had fulfilled its office
of caterer to the slender stems and delicate buds and
blossoms. It might now render up to Mother Earth
such earthy particles as had been borrowed from her to
perfect the fair desert flowers. They had not needed
* much—a little black mould, a rift in the dark rugged
rock to hold them in position, the rain and the dews to
178 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

nourish them, and the sunshine to tint the bells with a
ray from the fountain of light.

Sweet flowers! Were ye indeed “born to blush
unseen, and waste your sweetness on the desert air”?
How can we tell? May not the gardens of the great
Creator be realms of beauty to those who walk the earth

unseen by man ?

‘* Nor think though men were none,
That heaven would want spectators, God want praise ;
Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth
Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep ;
All these with ceaseless praise His works behdld.
Both day and night.”
THE CHILDREN OF THE FOREST

‘* Ye say they all have passed away,
That noble race and brave ;
That their light canoes have vanished
From off the crested wave ;
That in the forests where they roamed
There rings no hunter’s shout,—
But their name is on your waters,
Ye may not wash it out.”
—L, Sigowney.
Jupeine from the natural reticence of the dusky-
skinned Indian, one would not suppose him capable of
conceiving one poetical idea, yet under the stolid and
apparently unimaginative exterior there lies a store of
imagery, drawn from the natural objects around him,
which he studies more carefully than we do our most
interesting books. Nature is the only volume of know-
ledge to the child of the forest and plain. He borrows
no ideas from written books. His Manito, the Great

Spirit, the God of Nature, supplies all he needs. He
180 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

seeks for no rhymes in which to clothe his simple
thoughts, no flowery verse; but there is poetry in his
speech, and a musical ring in the names he has given to
the rivers, lakes and flowers that is absent in ours. The
Indian names are both descriptive and characteristic,
and in some instances contain the germ of local or dis-
tinctive history, which change or even mispronunciation
would obliterate for ever.

The disjointed syllables may not sound euphonious to
foreign ears, but to the understanding of the native
Indian they convey a simple description, a graphic word-
picture. The beautiful rapid Otonabee is described in
the name, “ water running swiftly flashing brightly ” ;
Katchewanook, “lake of three islands”; Ontario, “ sheet
of placid water”; Pem-a-dash-da-kota, “lake of the
burning plains,” the original name of Rice Lake. How
many years ago it was that these plains were burned
over they do not know, but that they were the scene of
a great conflagration the Indian name, as well as the
half-charred blackened roots below the surface of the
soil, prove. Napanee, the Indian word for flour, indi-
cates that on the site of that now flourishing town the
first flour-mills in the district were erected.

How much prettier is the Indian name for Spring
Beauty, “ Mis-ko-deed,” than the unmeaning botanical
one of Claytonia Virginica. In the latter some botan-
ist has perpetuated his own insignificant name of
Clayton, while the Indian mother, with truer instinct,
THE CHILDREN OF THE FOREST. 181

though she might give the name Mis-ko-deed to her
April-born child, would never name a flower after her
child.

The Indian girl’s name, Mad-wa-osha, is harsh on our
tongue until we render it into English in “murmuring
winds.” The Indians were always good friends to me,
and I have ever taken a great interest in and sympa-
thized with them, admiring their patience and quiet
endurance under great privations.

Would that the charitably disposed, who do so much for
the poor in the large cities, would turn their thoughts
more often to the suffering among the scattered remnant
of the former owners of the land! The men, restricted
by the narrow limits of civilization, die early, leaving
widows and orphans, or linger out a dull existence by
the fireside, their blood grown sluggish, and their one-
time energy in the chase weakened by the necessary
observance of the game laws. Those of the last genera-
tion have lost their spirit ; the boys of the present have
nothing to call theirs into active existence. I once
asked an Indian woman in the village what the great
boys I saw lounging about the streets did. “They?
Eat!” was the terse and emphatic reply.

But I am wandering away from the Indian names.
The one given me, Peta-wan-noo-ka, “red cloud of the
dawn,” was suggested by my rosy English complexion,
and those given to others among the early settlers in
the bush were equally poetical or descriptive.

13
182 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

What a pity it is that the meanings of all the Indian
names remaining to our lakes, rivers or cities are not
understood and made familiar; and greater pity still,
that in some cases they have been set aside to make
room for European names that have no significance to
Canadians.

About four miles above Stony Lake there is a shallow
piece of water known to the settlers by the name of
Bow-shink. This lake (though it hardly deserves the
term) lies below the highest elevation of land in that |
section, called “Jack’s Mountain,” famous for its deposits
of mica and other minerals. Seen through its embossing
mass of forest trees, the eye takes in little beyond the
silvery gleam of the water visible at intervals between
the trees.

One of the settlers, who was curious about the origin
of the Indian nomenclature, asked what the words
Bow-shink signified.

“Spilt water; looks like it,” replied the Indian,
Moses Muskrat, as he stalked away, laughing at the
conceit.

The words of lamentation for the dead, “ Wah-ha-
no-min,” when uttered by them in a long drawn-out,
mournful cadence and minor key, have an indescribable
wailing sound of grief and woe.

T'y-zah, spoken quickly with an upward inflection of
the voice, are excellent expressions of the combined
wonder, admiration and surprise the words are meant to
 

 

 

‘*Potty Cow’s Isianp.”
THE CHILDREN OF THE FOREST. 183

convey; and the low monotonous sounds, Ha-ha-ho-ho-
hi-hi, varied only by the transposing of the syllables,
and accompanied by a slow movement of the body, a
sort of rocking to and fro, is a soothing, sleep-inducing
cradle-song, which grows as one listens into a semblance
of the sighing sound of the summer wind among the
pine tops.

There is a dry humor, too, shown in some of their
names. “The-Man-with-Two-Tongues” is, I think, an
excellent sobriquet for a liar or deceiver, a character
greatly despised by the Indian.‘ The-Man-who-Walks-
Under-the-Dirt ” may be taken to mean a miner, but it
has possibly an allegorical and deeper significance to
their ears.

Their code of morality is quite as well defined as in
our own decalogue, but is, of course, not more strictly
kept by the bad Indian than our own by the bad white
man who disgraces the name of Christian.

Their laws are few and simple, suited to the savage
for the protection of life and property between man and
man. Theft, lying, murder—that is, taking life without
justifiable cause—comprise the criminal code.

Their religion was pantheistic before evangelization,
and the older people in the Rice Lake district held a
vague belief in a great and good Spirit, an overruling
Deity; but even this knowledge was dim and was
limited to such as were under the influence of their
wise or “medicine” men. They had a general belief in
184 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

the power of demons or inferior spirits who ruled the
elements of water, earth and air. These were their
Lares and Penates, like the houseliold gods of the
heathen Greeks and Romans, but the Indians made no
graven images or idols to represent these imaginary
spirits. They gave propitiatory offerings of food or
drink to avert their displeasure, or as thanks for favors
received, and before meals a morsel cast from their hand
or a few drops of liquid were thus given as a sort of
silent grace, but the custom is now no longer seen
among the Christian Indians.

It is seventy years since the work of evangelizing the
Indians of this part of Ontario was begun through the
efforts of the missionaries, and it has pleased God’s
Spirit to bless their labors. All honor to the devoted
men who labored so faithfully to preach the gospel of
Christ to the red men, to bring them out of darkness
into the blessed light of love and everlasting life. With
the simplicity of children they have received the truth
and kept it.

The little hamlet of Hiawatha, on the north shore of
Rice Lake, sent forth Peter Jacobs, John Sunday and
others whose names are not so familiar to me —earnest
Christian workers to carry the Word to the red men of
other tribes.

Some few years ago the Reverend Dr. Bethune (not
our respected late Bishop, though bearing the same
name, but the Lutheran Bishop of Brooklyn, U.S.) was
THE CHILDREN OF THE FOREST. 185

on a visit to a family residing on the south side of Rice
Lake, opposite to the little Indian village The Doctor,
in the early years of his ministry, had been a teacher
and evangelizer of the Indians, and loved the work.

In reply to a neighboring clergyman’s complaint of
the difficulty of reaching the understanding of the
Indians and of breaking through their stolid indiffer-
ence, he said,

“ Ah, my friend, you do not go the right way to work.
You must reach the Indian through his knowledge, not
through yours, from the word-pictures written in the
only book he knows, the book of Nature.”

On Sunday morning at an early hour Doctor Bethune
crossed the lake to preach to the Indians, and was met
on the shore by the leading men.

One of them—it might have been John Sunday, or

George Copway, or Tobico—asked the Doctor to explain
the work of the Holy Spirit in giving light to the
soul, an enquiry which elicited the following brief but
effective sermon :— |

“My Indian brothers, look at the lake before you.”

The Indians uttered a groan-like “Ugh!” They
could not see the water—lake and sunlight alike were
obscured by a thick fog. They gazed upon it, no one
speaking. The preacher bent his head in silent prayer.

Suddenly a light wind, stirring the air, breathed upon
the mist, and as if by some magical touch the dense
curtain began to rise. and slowly rolling back to the
186 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

hills and tree-tops, allowed the sun in all its morning
splendor to shed its light upon the little band of
expectant worshippers. Then the preacher, lifting his
hand, said: “ Even as the rays of yon sun break through
the dense mists that hid his face and the dark waters of
the lake below from your sight, so the Spirit of the
blessed Lord Jesus, the Son of God, shines down into
the hearts of men, showing the dark waters of sin and
lifting the cloud which hid from them all the goodness
and power and mercy of their Father who is in Heaven.
This light is life. ‘Let the wicked forsake his way, and
the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return
unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and
to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.’ My Indian
brothers, let us pray.”

“ The preacher’s words are good; your Indian brothers
see light in them,” was the hearty response to this
simple and beautiful discourse.

“In Nature’s book on lake and stream,
And flower-strewn path, anid isle untrod
By pale-face feet, the red man reads
The word of the eternal God.
The dawn to him a promise gives,
The day the looked-for gift bestows ;
He reads the signs, by reason lives
His part to do—for well he knows
That Nature fails not nor deceives—
Trusts the Great Spirit and believes.”
THOUGHTS ON VEGETABLE
INSTINCT.

THE great Creator has endowed all vegetables with a
property analogous to life and sensation. The plant,
like the animal, is subject to the law of death and decay.
This very fact is a proof of life, for that which has not
life cannot be said to die.

Differing from the animal, we still find in the plant
an inanimate power exerted for its preservation, ‘This
power, which might be termed Vegetable Instinct,
seems even in the plant an approach to the exercise
of will, though in a very limited degree. This may be
instanced in its selection or rejection of such nutriment
as is suitable or detrimental to its growth.

The tree, indeed, is not gifted with volition to change
its place, as the animal or even the insect can do; it
cannot come and go, but it can refuse to grow and
flourish where it has been planted, should soil or climate

4
188 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

prove foreign to its nature. It shows, as it were, a will
of its own, which is often stubborn and resists inter-
ference from man’s will; and man must conform as far
as it is possible to the natural wants of the tree or the
plant if he would turn it to his own advantage.

The vegetable, like the animal, experiences hunger,
and must be fed. Like the animal, also, it seems to be
endowed with a power of choice. It has its likings and
dislikings ; it rejects or selects according to its peculiar
tastes and necessities.

Man by his superior gifts can, by care and observation,
give to the plant what is needful to promote its growth,
and by long experience is enabled to acclimatize,
improve, and, as it were, educate the plant for his own
uses, through the power given him by God.

The florist or the agriculturist is able to increase the
value of his crops by studying the best food for the
plants whose seed he casts into the ground. Yet, that
there is a diversity in the requirements of some vege-
tables is evident. Some species are gross and demand
rich soil; others of a more delicate habit are abstemious,
and will thrive best with the most scanty nourishment,
where the ranker feeding kinds would starve.

The little Carpet Weed, a small hardy plant belonging
to the Poligonum family, grows and thrives by our path
in dry sandy soil; down-trodden and despised: it still
flowers and increases, where another species would perish
utterly. In richer mould and under the protecting hand
THOUGHTS ON VEGETABLE INSTINCT. 189

of culture, this sturdy little plant might dwindle away
and lose its hardihood. °

There are marvels of beauty among the Orchids, which
feed upon what the atmosphere alone supplies. These
floral beauties, dressed in the most glorious colors, seem
to be fed by air and sunbeams, the gifts of Him who
made their forms so wondrous fair and caused their
seed, invisible to our eyes, to fall upon some sapless
branch, or wall, or rugged rock, there to grow and flour-
ish and die, perhaps never looked upon by the eye of
man.

Is it not wonderful how these lovely orchids grow and
thrive, and drink in the dews of heaven, expanding their
petals to receive the light and warmth, to become living
manifestations of the wisdom and goodness of Him who
made them for His glory and His pleasure, and fed them
by His care to delight other eyes than ours ?

It is true that in virtue of the authority vested in
man, he can subject in some measure the vegetable world
to his use. He was given power to subdue the earth
and govern it. That was his privilege during his state
of obedience, but now the earth is rebellious and it
requires labor to govern it and to restore that which was
cursed for his sake. The thorns and thistles must be
rooted up or the land will not yield to him its strength.
Labor isthe remedy, and man must exert both bodily
strength and mental skill to live. The life-supporting
grain must be cultivated : it will not yield its substance
190 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

spontaneously. So Christ is the remedy for the moral
weeds sown by our spiritual foe.

That the plant possesses an energy within itself to
overcome obstacles that interfere with its growth may
be noticed. I have seen an elm or beech embracing with
its strong elastic roots a huge block of stone, binding it
down while it sent out its smaller fibrous rootlets to the
soil below. The tree itself had sprung into life from a
seed that had fallen into a crevice of the rugged stone,
but as it advanced in stature it required more support
and more nutriment. Firmly rooted, it now defied the
force of wind and storm. It threw out its cables and its
anchors, and then began to flourish more abundantly—
not by the large woody roots, but by the tender vege-
table tubes drinking up the food from the more generous
soil which they had entered to wait upon and feed the
tree, like faithful servants ready to cater to their masters’
wants.

There is power in the living germ of a tiny seed. See
how the tender blade of wheat will pierce the hardest
clod. The seedling of some delicate flower will burst
through the environing mould, raising its soft plumy
leaflets to the light and air, while sending down its roots
deep into the earth, exerting a force from within its
tender frame that eludes the most cunning scrutiny of
the eye to detect. Silently and secretly this mysterious
action takes place in the sprouting seed. The sceptic
THOUGHTS ON VEGETABLE INSTINCT. 191

says, “It is the necessity of its nature.” True, but the
sceptic does not see God in Nature.

There is a curious adaptation in plants to overcome
certain obstacles that obstruct their progress in growth,
and that enables them to put forth certain energies
which under other circumstances are not exerted.

This is seen in the case of the ivy and many other
climbing plants. In its infant stage the ivy appears as
a tender light green plant, with sharply pointed leaves.
For a time it creeps over the ground; then when more
advanced, the leaves take a lobed form and become of a
‘dark green, the stem woody and branching. The slender
branchlets seeking support, it raises itself to any eleva-
tion from the ground, by means of some bush or the
trunk of a tree. It puts forth tiny flat feet, armed
with imperceptible rootlets, by which it attaches itself
to the rough surface of a wall or the bark of a tree. It
may be for shelter or support, it cannot be for nourish-
ment. It is not improbable that climbing is inherent in
its nature, and so it strives to overcome every obstacle
that interferes with its upward progress—who shall
say ?—and to this end it exerts, to accomplish its desire,
a power that it had no need to make use of in its former
condition.

The sower who casts his seed in the furrows of his
field never pauses to think how it will fall—whether or
not it shall lie in the best position for the germination

of the grain.
192 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Nature follows her own laws without heed to the
hand that sows the seed. The latter will right itself:
Place a bulb in the earth with the crown downward or
sideways, and it will come up in spite of the awkward
position it was planted in.

Here are a number of onions or of potatoes left lying
in all manner of ways; the shoots, you will notice, take
the upward direction attracted to the light. The innate
power in the living vegetable is to ascend to the light,
while the root descends, loving darkness rather than
light.

Thus the inanimate things of creation silently obey
the will of the Creator, fulfilling the work which He
has ordained to His praise and glory. He hath given
them laws which shall not be broken.

A FLORAL MYSTERY.

An interesting account of the peculiar properties of
some aquatic plants, as illustrative of what we have
called vegetable instinct, may not be out of place here,
and will perhaps be new to some of my youthful readers.

Michelet, the delightful old French naturalist, gives.
the following history of the Vallisneria, better known
by its common name of Tape or Eel Grass, an aquatic
plant very frequently seen in slow-flowing lakes and
ponds, covering the surface during the latter part of the
summer with its slender light green leaves and white

floating flowers :
THOUGHTS ON VEGETABLE INSTINCT. 193

“The blossoms of this water plant are of two kinds.
The stamens or pollen-bearing flowers are clustered on
short scapes (stems), and are seen growing at the bottom
of the lake or pond. The fertile or fruit-bearing
blossoms, on long thready elastic stalks, rise to the
surface of the water, and there expand to await the
appearance of the sterile or male flower, the buds of
which break away from the bottom of their watery bed
and float upwards, open out their petals, and, mingling
with the fertile flowers, shed upon them the fertilizing
pollen dust. The latter after awhile retire below the
surface by means of the spirally coiled seape, which, by
contracting, draws down the impregnated flower, there
to ripen and perfect its seed. The seed vessel, which is
a very long and slender pod, of an olive brown color, is
attached to the stalk of the female flower.”

The pretty white blossoms of this singular plant are
about the size of a quarter-dollar, and in the month of
August the flowers may be seen in some quiet bay,
covering the still waters with their snowy petals.

THE WHITE WATER LILY.

The beautiful Water Lily,* that “Queen of the Lakes,”
what pen can do justice to her loveliness !

The exquisitely folded buds are seen at all stages of
development, rising midway from the bed of the still
waters as you look downward into its depths. As they

 

* Nymphe Oderata.
194 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

reach the influence of the light and the warm sunshine,
the flowers expand into full-blown beauty and delicious
lemon-scented fragrance.

To float beside a bed of these beautiful flowers and
glossy, widespread leaves is a treat not to be forgotten.
As daylight closes to evening, the lovely blossoms fold
their snowy petals over the golden stamens and retire to
their watery chambers for the night.

The native water lilies of North America exceed in
size and beauty those of England, and there are varieties
found among our inland lakes in Ontario, tinged with
the most delicate rose pink.* I have seen, in one of the
inland lakes, a very small and lovely water lily hardly
exceeding a silver dollar in size.

In many aquatic plants we find the foliage is minutely
and finely divided, which enables the water to flow
through them without any impediment, as in the Pond-
weed Family. In the water Ranunculi the root leaves
are flat and wide-spreading, but as the plant ascends
the leaves are cut into fine, narrow segments, and so
allow the currents of water to pass freely through them.

 

*In my ‘“‘Studies of Plant Life,” illustrated by Mrs. Chamberlin, is given
a colored plate of the pink Nymphe Oderata.
SOME CURIOUS PLANTS.

BROOM RAPE.

Amone the wild vegetable products of our forests may
be found many strange-looking plants unlike any of
those with which we are familiar in our gardens or fields.

One of these is the Broom Rape (Orobanche). It
comes up in the woods, often by the pathway, and at
first glance you take it for a little bundle of hard dry
brown twigs, but on closer inspection you see that it is a
plant with life and growth in it.

The stems are clustered together at the base. It can
hardly be said to have any roots, and yet it is bearing
its flowers almost underground as well as upon its scaly
stems. Of foliage it has none, at least no green leaves,
only scales dry and brown, and the flowers are simply
two little hard-beaked, bead-shaped scales, made notice-
able by the abundance of yellowish stamens and anthers
which look like little heaps of sawdust. The stigmas
196 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

are not visible. The whole plant looks like a tiny brush
or broom, and is more remarkable for the oddity of its
appearance than for its beauty.

It belongs to a singular family, that known-as the
Orobanche or Broom Rape family, to which also the term
Caricer Root has been popularly given. I believe this
curious plant is used by the Indian herb doctor as a cure
for cancer, but whether outwardly or inwardly is not
known.

There are several species, some of the order having
blue and white tubular flowers, others yellowish-brown
and hairy; all are parasites on the roots of oak, beech
and some other trees.

INDIAN PIPE.

Another of our curious flowers is the Indian Pipe
(Monotropa wniflora). This singular plant is distin-
guished by its pure whiteness, without one tinge of color.
From root to summit it is spotless, white as new fallen
snow. It is also called the Wood Snowdrop. It attracts
the eye by its contrast to the dark rich mould on which
it grows, generally at the foot of beech trees, sending up
a cluster of white-scaled stems some nine or ten inches
in height. Each thick stem is terminated by one white
pellucid flower about the size of a small tobacco pipe,
the head slightly bent downward at first, but becoming
erect for the better preservation of the seed.

So sensitive is this remarkable plant that it turns black
SOME CURIOUS PLANTS, 197

soon after being pulled, as if polluted by contact with
the human hand. In the herbarium it loses all its
beauty, turning black as ink, nor can it retain its semi-
transparent texture. To appreciate the plant it must be
seen growing in the shade of the forest.

There is another species, found only in pine and ever-
green woods, which is of a tawny color, the stem woolly
and bearing from three to-five flowers. The bells, when
upright, are filled with drops of clear honey,

This is known as Sweet Pine Sap. Like the uniflora
the Pine Sap (Monvtropa hypopitys) is a perfect flower
and not a fungous growth, as some have supposed. It
also is leafless, the foliage being mere thin scales arranged
along the scape.

THE DODDER,

The Dodder (Cuscuta) is another of our eccentric
plants, of which we have several native species.

The singularity of one of these struck me as very
remarkable, from the attachment it showed for one
particular little plant, a slender species of Golden Rod.
There were other plants growing near these Dodders
which would have given all the needed support, but
they evidently did not possess the same attraction and
were passed by—it was the little Solidago and none
other. It really looked like will in the Dodders.

And what was strange, too, both plants seemed

perfectly healthy—while the clustered flowers of the
14
198 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Dodder coiled round the supporting stem of the Golden
Rod, the latter bore its yellow blossoms fresh and fair
to view uninjured. I preserved several specimens of the
united flowers for my herbal.

The stem of the Dodder was leafless, of a rather rusty
green, hard and wiry; the numerous clusters of flowers —
were greenish white.

Another species of this curious plant, with thready
orange-colored coils, I found on the rocks twining among
grasses and other herbage.

SENSITIVE PLANTS.

There are certain flowers, the floral organs of which
are so sensitive that the slightest touch affects them.

This sensibility, though differing from what I have
called vegetable instinct, seems to indicate a sense of
feeling akin to a life principle existing in the flower.
Possibly the more learned naturalist may object to my
crude idea on this most interesting subject. I know little
beyond what observation teaches or suggests, and am
open to correction when I err. My main object in these
pages has been to awaken an interest in young readers,
such as to induce them to seek and learn for themselves.
Knowledge thus gained is very pleasant and leads
upward and onward to higher and more satisfactory.
results.

Everyone knows the nervous sensitiveness of the
leaves of the Sensitive Plant, which on the slightest
SOME CURIOUS PLANTS. 199

touch from the finger instantly closes and collapses as
if fainting; but it is not of this and others of a similar
nature that I wish to remark, but of a few of our native
flowers.

There is the not uncommon shrub, the Berberry, the
blossoms of which can easily be tested. If the base
of the stamens is touched with a pin or needle they
instantly close together. Probably a similar effect is
produced by the tongue of the bee or the sucker of a
fly. Not only to scatter the pollen dust, but it may be
to guard the germen of the flower from injury, this
movement of the stamens takes place.

The same effect seems to be produced in the sensitive
organs of the flowers of that pretty shrub known as
Dog-bane (Apocynum androsemifolium) or shrubby
Milk-weed. The little pink-striped blossoms of this
plant seem to be chosen by some species of very small
fly as a sleeping place (that is, if flies do sleep). As
evening dews begin to fall they resort to the sweet-
scented bells for rest or shelter, but are instantly
captured by the flower stamens, as may be seen by
the closed anther tips. In every bell a tiny prisoner is
held fast in the tenacious clasp of the organs of the
flower.

It has been a matter of dispute whether the Pitcher
Plant (Sarracenia Purpurea) feeds upon the insects
that creep within its hollow tube-like leaves or not.
That the insects, flies or beetles, enter either for shelter
200 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

or for the fluids contained in these beautiful natural
vases seems most likely, and having entered, the stiff,
reflexed hairs that line the tubes form a barrier to their
exit. The consequence is that they are either drowned,
which is most probably their fate, or made prisoners for
life. The trap proves fatal to the unwary flies, but
the plant*can in nowise be answerable for their death.
They had ‘no business to intrude themselves uninvited
on the premises, and so there can be no case of wilful
murder against the pitcher plants. The verdict is
“accidental death,” and an impartial jury, could such
be called, would say, “Serves them right! what business
had they there?”

Nor can it be proved that the plants derive any
benefit from the intrusion of the insects otherwise than
that all vegetables feed on the carbonic exhalations
arising from decomposing animal or vegetable matter.

The pitcher plant is the northern representative of a
most remarkable order. It oceurs both in Canada and
all over the continent of North America, and if not so
wonderful in appearance as some of the magnificent
tropical species, it is too singular in structure and habits
to be passed by without notice.

Well worth seeing, indeed, is a bed of pitcher plants,
especially in the month of June, their flowering time.

The tall, naked scape bears one large deep red
blossom. From the globular five-rayed ovary rises a
short, pillar-like style which expands into a thin yellow
SOME CURIOUS PLANTS. 201

umbrella-shaped body, elegantly scalloped at the edges
and covering the floral organs, adding greatly to the
beauty of the flower.

All the parts of the flower are in fives—petals, sepals
and valves of the seed vessel. The root is thick and
fleshy, the hollow leaves beautifully veined with bright
crimson ; the lip or mouth of the leaves is scalloped and
the interior fringed with stiff, silvery hairs. |

Following the inner part of each leaf runs a membrane
like a flap. This curious appendage, being shorter than
the outside curve of the leaf, throws the hollow mouth
into the right position for receiving and retaining the
water with which the pitcher is generally half filled.

In some species of this most interesting order of plants
there is a natural lid which probably answers the same
purpose. In some the urn or pitcher is a prolongation
of the leaf, and is suspended by a tendril. The flower,
which is distinct from the curious hollow leaf, fades
quickly and bears an abundance of seed. The whole
plant is singular in all its parts, and is a sight to be

admired.
SOME VARIETIES OF POLLEN.

THE fertilizing dust or pollen of different flowers varies
in shape, no two species being exactly alike when
examined under a powerful microscope.

As the subject may have hitherto escaped the atten-
tion of my readers, I will notice what varieties have
been perceived and made note of by such scientific
naturalists as Jussieu, Malpighi and others.

Malpighi, the learned French naturalist, found that
the pollen of the sunflower was round, but beset with
rough prickles; in the cranesbill or geranium family
the particles were perforated ; in the mallow they took
the form of wheels with teeth; in the palma Christi, like
grains of wheat; in pansies, angular; in maize or Indian,
corn, flat and smooth; in borage, like a thin rolled-up
leaf; in conifers, double globules.

The observations of Jussieu concerning the pollen of
the maple deserves our notice. He says: “Those gentle-
men who have minutely examined the fertilizing dust of
SOME VARIETIES OF POLLEN. ~ 208

the flower of the maple, have drawn the figure of the
particles in form of a cross, but I find them to be globu-
lar ; nevertheless, as soon as they were touched with
moisture they instantly burst into four parts, assuming
the form of the cross.

“From which it may be inferred that the hollow
globules contained some subtle fluid which, when moist-
ened by rain or dew, burst and discharged their contents
on the surrounding organs of the flower.’—Evelyn’s
Silva.

What wondrous secrets are revealed to us through the
medium of the microscope! What a world of interest
does it open to the inquiring mind of the young student
of Nature!

The minutest insect, the wing of a fly, a drop of
puddle water, the capsule of a tiny moss, or a morsel of
sea-weed, are revelations sealed to the mere outward,
unassisted vision.

A scientist once remarked, “Life, even a long life, is
not long enough to take in the thousandth part of
what wonders the microscope could reveal to us in one
short hour, of things so insignificant that we pass them
by without seeing or caring for them.”

There is nothing small in God’s sight. To us these
things may appear insignificant, but all have been created
with a purpose, and go to complete the wonderful work

4

of the creation.
204 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

‘ POLLEN OF THE WHITE PINE.

When I first settled in the backwoods of northern
Ontario, I noticed that after heavy thunder-storms the
water on the surface of the lake and the puddles on the
ground were covered with a fine sulphur-colored powdery
substance, which lay like a thin yellow crust on the
earth after the water had evaporated. On asking an
old settler what it was, he answered, “Sulphur, which
comes down with the rain from the clouds. We call
them sulphur showers, for it is always seen in this
country after thunder-storms.”

Not being quite convinced of the real nature of the
substance, I collected a portion of it, dried it and for-
warded it to a friend who was the possessor of a fine
microscope of four hundred magnifying power. I
received from him a drawing of the magnified powder
grains, which resembled grains of wheat, a central line
dividing the figure, giving the idea of duality to the
form of each atom.

My friend pronounced the substance to be the pollen
of the White or Weymouth Pine (Pinus strobus).

This settled the matter and was perfectly conclusive,
especially as this sulphur-looking substance is seen only
during the time when the cone-bearing trees are in
flower in July, which is also the time when thunder-
storms are most general.

The extreme lightness of the pollen dust renders it
SOME VARIETIES OF POLLEN. 205

probable that it may ascend into the upper air or cloud
region, and be precipitated to the earth during heavy
showers.

It is a curious and, if needed, a convincing fact, that
this phenomenon is rarely, if ever, noticed now in the
cleared parts of the country. This may be attributed
to the great destruction of the pines, the forests in
many places being denuded almost to the extermina-
tion of these noble trees. The time, indeed, seems fast
approaching when the pine tribe will disappear and
become a thing of the past only.

While writing on the subject of the so-called “Sulphur
Showers,” I was much pleased and surprised by reading
a passage I met with quite unexpectedly in a volume of
that rare and interesting book, “Evelyn’s Sylva.” It is
so much to the purpose that I will transcribe it. The
writer observes :

“The figure of each of the minute particles which
form so important a part in the economy of every plant
and tree, probably varies in shape in each tribe, even in
the various species.

“To the unassisted eye we see only a fine yellow or
grey dust that floats so lightly on the air that the least
breath of wind ruffling the branches moves it, and so
light and so plentiful is the supply that, if it chances to
rain during the flowering season of the pines, the stand-
ing waters near will be painted with yellow rings of
this dust from the trees.”
206 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

It is known that the mingling of pollen from flowers.
of the same natural order, through the agency of bees
and other winged insects, is the cause of the great.
variety of species which we find in plants of the same
family; thus the different races of plants can be traced
back to their natural orders, including the genus and

species of every family in all its variations.

#
THE CRANBERRY MARSH.

To THE EYE of the botanist our cranberry marshes are
fields of beauty and of great interest.

Elegant wreaths of this beautiful evergreen plant,
with its tiny dark green, glossy leaves, trail over lovely
peat mosses, the Sphagnum cymbefoliwm and the
Sphagnum ciliare.

The delicate pink bells, pendent on their light thready
stalks, are seen through the season with the fruit in
every stage of growth and color, from the tiny dot not
larger than the head of a pin to the pear-shaped, full-
sized berry, green, yellow and bright purplish-red,
hanging among the soft, creamy mosses; and, often,
over all, a forest of the stately chain fern or the noble
Osmundi regalis, both of which love the moisture of
the peat soil and the cranberry marsh.

These marshes are the nurseries of many other
varieties of ferns, flowers, orchids, plants and shrubs.
They are also the haunts of harmless species of snakes,
208 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

for although the black snake and the copper-head have
rather a doubtful reputation, I have never yet heard of
any injury being suffered from these obnoxious reptiles.

All sorts of flies are bred in these marshy places—
mosquitoes, deer-flies and big gad-flies (the terror of the
cattle in the North-West, under the name of “bull dogs”),
and most likely those little torments, the Canadian
black flies, may nestle there, too. Owing to this rather
undesirable company, the lovely wild garden is rather
shunned by the timid botanist during the months of May
and June, when it puts forth its greatest attractions in
flowers and shrubs.

To enter into this paradise of wild flowers and flies,
moths and beetles, the naturalist must not be afraid of
mosquitoes or wet feet, nor must he mind tripping in a
hidden network of tangled roots. Such accidents will
not hurt him, and if he is an enthusiastic botanist or
entomologist, he will laugh at such trifling matters and
scramble on in spite of black snakes or bull-frogs, to be
rewarded by finding many a rare bog orchid, unobtain-
able upon the dusty highways and byways among the
common haunts of men.

Just fancy a young field naturalist returning from an
exploring tour in the cranberry marsh. He is hot and
tired, a good deal fly-bitten, dilapidated in dress and
appearance, somewhat the worse for wear, but with
looks that tell of unexpected good fortune.

Having hastily satisfied his hunger and thirst at
THE CRANBERRY MARSH. 209

the camp, he unstraps his japanned case, and, his face
beaming with triumphant smiles, proceeds to exhibit
his wonderful finds in the shape of rare beetles of
metallic hues, green, red, scarlet, blue and sulphur-
colored; dragon-flies large and small, bronze, blue, red
or metallic green; silvery moths with dappled wings or
elegant blue ones with brilliant eyes.

From a little pill-box which he has carried carefully
in his vest pocket he takes a tiny land tortoise, no
bigger than a black beetle, that he found basking in the
sand near a creek and only just hatched from its warm
shady nest.

And then he will be off the next morning at sunrise
to the big peat moss which he has not yet had leisure to
explore.

The peat mosses are, of all our native mosses, the
most worthy of notice. They form extensive beds,
many acres in extent, in overflowed marshes, extinct
lakes and partially dried beaver meadows, where the
bottom soil is still wet and spongy.

In such situations where these white mosses abound,
mingled with the running vines of the cranberry there
are other marsh-loving plants and shrubs, such as the
Labrador Tea (Ledum latifolia), the Wild Rosemary
(Andromeda polifolia), the Kalmia and the white and
pink flowered Spirea.

Here, too, we meet with large beds of the curious and
interesting pitcher plants and that little gem, the sundew.
210 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

The leaves of this latter plant are round in form, of a
red color, the edges beset with pellucid, shining drops,
reflecting the rays of light like diamonds. There are
two species, the Drosera rotundifolia and the Drosera
longifolia. The flowers are small and white, sometimes
tinged with pink and borne on tall stems. The former
is the prettier of the two. In such places, also, we find
some of our rarest orchids—the Grass Pink (Colopogen
pulchellus), the stemless Lady’s Slipper (Cyprepedium
acaule), the Ram’s Head Orchis (C. aristenum), the
Arethusa; the Calypso borealis, or Bird’s Eye Orchis,
and many others.

When very young the peat moss is of the liveliest
tender green, but as it increases in growth it becomes of
a creamy whiteness, which deepens again with age to
soft rose pink, the fruitful plant turning to a deep
rose purple and the bud-like capsules collecting at the
summit.
_ The foliage of the larger species is soft and cottony,

drooping or flaccid, densely clothing the upright stems,
which in height often measure from nine inches to a
foot, and being interwoven support each other, forming
deep, soft beds.

Nor are the peat mosses without their uses. They
are so soft and pliable that they are found most service-
able to the florist, nurseryman and gardener as a suitable
material for packing the roots of plants and shrubs for
THE CRANBERRY MARSH. 211

‘distant transportation, for which purpose many tons are
used in the year.

There are several species of sphagnums. The slender,
‘delicate S. acutifoliwm has narrower leaves than the
S. cymbefolium. The capsules are green, not red, and
the plant is not so robust, but it is still curious and fair
to look upon.

Many other kinds of coarse mosses also mingle with
the sphagnums and form pleasing contrasts to the’
whiter mosses and bog-loving plants.
OUR NATIVE GRASSES.

‘* And the blithe grass blades that stand straight up
And make themselves small, to leave room for all
The nameless blossoms that nestle between
Their sheltering stems in the herbage green ;
Sharp little soldiers, trusty and true,
Side by side in good order due;
Arms straight down, and heads forward set,
And saucily-pointed bayonet,
Up the hillocks, and down again,
The green grass marches into the plain,
If only a light wind over the land
Whispers the welcome word of command.”
—Lord Lytton.

MopERN botanists have separated the old natural order
of the grasses into three distinct divisions—the grass
proper, Graminew; the sedges, Cyperacew; the rushes,
Juncacee. But my knowledge of them is according to
the old school, which included all in one great order.
The stately, gigantic bamboo of the tropics; the sugar-
cane, the flexible cane-brake of the southern swamps;
OUR NATIVE GRASSES. 213

the useful broom-cane; the graceful feathery plumed
grass of the Pampas, waving in the breeze like gently-
heaving billows of a silvery shining sea; the heavy
dark-headed bulrush so familiar to the eye; the verdant
rice and the purple-topped Indian corn with its silky
tassels and golden fruit—all these, and the coarse grassés
that grow on every wild, uncultivated spot, rushes, reeds.
and sedges—all and every species were classed with
the sweet vernal grasses of the meadows and pastures ;
from the highest to the lowest, they were all included
under the familiar name of Grass.

The rich variety and abundance of the native grasses
of the western and north-western prairies of this great
American continent form one of its most attractive
features—great waving oceans of verdure where the
bison once fed, but which are now yielding to the plow
of the settler. Man by his reckless greed has driven off
and well-nigh exterminated the bison (Indian buffalo)
from the plains of Manitoba and the Saskatchewan,
and the wild grasses of the prairie are also destined to
disappear with the wild herds which fed upon them.

It is a singular fact that among all the many varieties
of the prairie grasses there are no true grain-bearing
cereals to be found, none producing seed sufficiently
nutritive for the support of man. Although many of
the grasses resemble oats, wheat, barley and maize, there
seems to be in the substance they produce an absence of

the qualities required to make bread.
15
214 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

The most edible grain that we find in a wild state is
the Zizania aquatica, or “Water Oats”—the Indian
rice—but it is not a native of the prairies, and is not
found in many of the inland lakes of our North-
West, though abundant in the slow-flowing waters of
Ontario.

It grows in many of the upper lakes in such large
beds as to resemble islands, and in the shallow bays and
coves attains so rank a growth as to impede the passage
of boats. When in flower it is one of the most graceful
and lovely of our native grasses. The long flexible
ribbon-like leaves float loosely on the surface of the
water, and the tall spikes of the pretty straw-colored
an] purple anthers, freed from the fold of the slender
stalks, hang gracefully fluttering in the breeze.

When the leaves turn yellow, and the grain ripens in
the mellow days of late September or October, the Indian
women gather it into their canoes by means of a short
thin-bladed paddle, with which they strike the heads of
the grain-bearing stalks against a stick held in the other
hand and over the edge of the canoe.

The wild rice has a peculiar weedy, smoky flavor, but
if properly cooked is very delicious. The Indians pre-
serve it in many ways, and look upon it as belonging
especially to them. They call the month of the rice
harvest the “ Moon of the Ripe Rice.”

One of my Indian friends always brings me each year
a pretty birch-bark basket of wild rice, giving it to me
OUR NATIVE GRASSES. 215

with the kindly words, spoken in her own soft tongue,
“ Present for you.”

These little offerings are very sweet tome. They are
genuine tokens.of simple gratitude and affection, and for
which I never offer any payment, knowing it would be
at once rejected, for the rice is a free-will gift and there-
fore priceless.

The deer, too, feed upon the rice beds. The doe leads
down her fawn to the lake, and the sweet, tender grassy
leaves of the young rice are eaten eagerly by the gentle
creature. In the season countless wild-fowl come from
the colder regions of the north, and the sportsmen know
their favorite feeding beds among the rice fields of the
inland lakes.

‘There is a beautiful chapter on “Grass” in the Rev.
Hugh MeMillan’s charming volume, “ Bible Teaching in
Nature,” which I wish everyone could read. I would
gladly transcribe much of it, but would not thus rob my
readers of the pleasure of enjoying the book for them-
selves. A few words only I must quote here:

“ Grass forms the beautiful and appropriate covering
of the grave. As it was the earth’s first blessing, so it
is her last legacy to man. The body that it fed when
living, it reverently covers when dead with a garment
richer than the robe of a king.

“When all other kindness in food and clothing and
emblematical teaching is over, it takes up its Rizpah
watch beside the tomb, and forsakes not what all else
216 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

has forsaken. Gently does it wrap up the ashes of the
dead, wreathing like a laurel crown the cold damp brow
with its interlacing roots, drawing down to the darkness
and solitude of the grave the warm bright:sunshine and
blessed dews of heaven.”

There is many an unknown grave in Canada long
deserted and forgotten. In the early days of the colony
the settlers were wont to bury their -dead in some spot
set apart as a family burying-ground. There was little
attention paid to the rites of religion, and little ceremony,
for the dwellers were few, and their houses often far
apart—some on the banks of lonely forest streams,
others near the great lakes, and some deep-seated in the
heart of the woods.

A prayer, maybe a hymn or psalm, a mother’s tears,
and then the grass and wild-flowers took possession of
the grave and hallowed it. Rude was the soil and
lonely the spot—a rough rail enclosure, a surface stone
to mark where lay the sleeper, or a cross of wood, or a
name rudely cut upon the living bark of some adjacent
tree, the sole memorial of the dead.

The lands have passed away from the families of the
first breakers of the soil, and the peaceful dead are
neglected in their lonely, unmarked resting-places,
forgotten by man, but not uncared for by Redeeming
Love.
OUR NATIVE GRASSES. 217

THE GRAVES OF THE EMIGRANTS.

They sleep not where their fathers sleep,
In the village churchyard’s bound ;
They rest not ‘neath the ivied wall
That shades that holy ground ;

Nor where the solemn organ’s peal
Pours music on the breeze,

Through the dim aisles at evening hour,
Or swells among the trees ;

Nor where the turf is ever green,
And flowers are blooming fair

Upon the graves of the ancient men
Whose children rest not there ;

Nor where the sound of warning bell
Floats mournfully on high,

And tells the tale of human woe,
That all who live must die.

Where, then, may rest those hardy sons
Who left their native shore

To seek a home in distant lands
Beyond the Atlantic’s roar ?

They sleep in many a lonely spot
Where mighty forests grow,
Where stately oak and lofty pine

Their darkling shadows throw.

The wild-bird pours her matin song
Above their lonely graves,

And far away in the stilly night
Is heard the voice of waves.
218

PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Fair lilies, nursed by weeping dews,
Unfold their blossoms pale,

And spotless snow-flowers lightly bend
Low to the passing gale.

The fire-fly lights her little spark
To cheer the leafy gloom,

Like Hope’s blest ray that gilds the night
And darkness of the tomb.

Where moss-grown stone or simple cross
Its silent record keeps,

There, deep within the forest shade,
The lonely exile sleeps.
INDIAN GRASS.*

THIs is one of the most remarkable of our native
grasses, both as respects its appearance and habits as
well as the use the Indian women make of it in the
manufacture of all sorts of ornamental trifles and useful
articles. They weave its long, flexible shining dark
green leaves into baskets, mats, braids and many other
things. As I write I have before me a cup and saucer
neatly and skilfully woven together in one piece by the
dusky fingers of an Indian squaw.

The Indian grass retains its color for a long time, and
its fine aromatic perfume, resembling the scent of vanilla,
remains for many years after it is cut and woven into

the various articles made from it.

 

*The Indian Grass, commonly so-called, is the identical ‘‘ Holy Grass”
of northern Europe. The botanical name Hierochloa is derived from the
Greek words meaning sacred and grass, the custom of strewing churches
and other sacred buildings with this fragrant plant giving it the name. It
“was only when reading Smiles’ ‘‘Memoirs of Robert Dick” (long after the
above was written), and the account that industrious naturalist gives of
this plant, that I instantly recognized it as the same found in Ontario and
used by the Indian women in their work.
220 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

This grass, with the quills of the porcupine (which the
squaws dye), moose-hair, the bark of the silver or white
birch and the inner bark of various other trees—bass,
cedar, oak and beech—from which they make the
coarser baskets, are the only stock-in-trade now left to |
the poor Indians.

The soil in which the Indian grass grows is for the
most part light, sandy, low ground, near water, so the
Indians tell me; but it is also found in prairie lands,
where it is very beautiful, the husk or plume being of
a purplish color and very bright and shining. Under
cultivation it is very shy of blossoming, but the leaf
attains to a great length. In my own garden it grows
most luxuriantly, the blade often measuring nearly three
feet.

It breaks the ground early in the spring, before any
other grass has begun to show itself on the lawn. Like
the spear-grass it has a running root, pointed and sharp,
to pierce the moist soil, and is hardy, remaining green
and bright in cold or in summer drought. It does not
give out its perfume until a few hours after it has been
cut. One of its useful qualities lies in its toughness—it
will not break when being twisted or braided, and can
even be knotted or tied—and it is this elasticity which
enables the Indian women to make it so available in
their manufactures.

I have myself used it, making it into table mats, and
find it pretty and useful for that purpose. I used to
INDIAN GRASS. 221

_ get from the Indians pretty braided chains, confined at
intervals by bands or rings of dyed quills or beads.
These I sent home to England, where they were highly

esteemed for the work and the sweet scent of the grass.
One of these chains is still in existence and has lost
little of its fragrance.

I have sometimes suggested that the aroma might be
utilized as a toilet article in the way, of perfume.

The Indian women of the present generation are much
more refined, and pay more attention to cleanliness in
their habits than did their mothers and grandmothers.
A lady who was returning to her friends in England
asked me to procure for her some of these grass chains.
I applied to an Indian woman, who readily set to work
to supply them, seating herself under one of the trees in
the grove near my garden. On going out to bring her
some refreshment, great was my dismay to see a great
length of the grass braid wound round her by no means
delicately clean big toe.

When I protested against this mode of proceeding,
she laughed and said, “ Good. way, hold it all tight, nice.”

But finding that I made.great objection to her “nice
way” of holding the braiding, she stuck a sharp stick
into the ground, and fastened the coil of braid round it,
and seemed convinced that this way was “nicer” than
the other.

She had been perfectly unconscious that there was
anything objectionable in her original mode of weaving
=

229 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

the lady’s chain until I pointed out its impropriety.
Then she perceived it, and laughing, said, “ Dirty foot,
not nice.”

The good-natured squaw took no offence with me
for my disapproval of her primitive way of working.
Gentle, patient, accustomed to be ruled from childhood,
the Indian woman bears, suffers and submits without.
complaint.

Many a gentle Christian character have I known
among the Indian women of the Rice Lake and Mud
Lake villages, not unworthy of the name of the Master:
whose teachings they so meekly followed.

The men die out, leaving widows and helpless children
to be maintained. No one seems to care for the wants.
of the poor Indians beyond the officials whose part it is.
to carry out the regulations from the Indian Department
of the Government in their behalf. But there seems to.
be a lack of sympathy shown to these poor people.
They endure sickness and hunger, and suffer many trials.
in silence, never appealing for charity at any of the
public institutions or private societies so long as they
can work. The Indian will trade for bread, but rarely
ever asks for it; he has a pride of his own, peculiar to
his race.

He is not ungenerous by nature—indeed, an Indian
loves to give little marks of his gratitude when kindly
treated.

“Present for you,” the squaw will say, laying beside.
INDIAN GRASS. 223

your purchase a tiny canoe, a basket of birch bark, or
some other trifle, and when money is offered in return
she says, “ Vo, no, no—for love of kindness to me.”

There is something kindly in the Indian’s nature. I
like the words they close their letters with,

“I kiss you in my heart,

From your Indian friend.”

The Indian women outlive the men. Their quiet,
peaceful temper, sobriety and industrious habits may
account for this fact; but the men have not the same
resources and are not in their natural state, Their
spirit seems broken, and they become slow and inactive,
and pine away early. Change of habit from the old
out-of-door life of the hunter and trapper preying upon
them, they die under the restrictive laws of civilization,
and in another century it will be asked where is the
remnant of the native race? and but that the dark eye,
black hair and dusky skin may be traced in a few
scattered individuals, it may be doubted if they ever
existed or had left any descendants in the land.
MOSSES AND LICHENS.

I FEAR my readers may turn over these few pages and
regard the subjects as things of little worth—mosses and
lichens, dry, uninteresting objects that we tread under
our feet or pass by without giving them a second glance
—and place them among the rough “ Pebbles,” not the
choice “ Pearls” of my collection.

Uninviting and trivial as the subject may be to many,
I am confident that to the true lover of Nature they
will not be without their interest, and may possibly
_ direct attention to a world of beauty which has
hitherto escaped his notice.

The lichens, the fungi and the mosses were probably
the earliest forms of vegetable life. Before the grasses
and small herbs these may have been created as a
promise of what should clothe the young earth with
verdure. The sea-weeds (Algw) may, indeed, have
preceded them, and we might call them, not inaptly, the
MOSSES AND LICHENS. . 225

mosses of the seas, and place them at the head (as they
are by right of priority) of this world of vegetation.

The most attractive of our mosses grow in the shadiest,
thickest of our woods, where, at the foot of some huge
maple, ash or elm, in the rich damp vegetable mould, you
will find one of the handsomest and largest, the Hypnum
splendens ; or, it may be, forming a miniature forest on
the decaying trunk of one of the prostrate giants of the
wood, where it spreads its feathery fan-shaped fronds,
branchlets which spring from a somewhat stiff and wiry
stem, each set apparently denoting the product of a
year’s growth.

The foliage of these fan-shaped fronds is soft, much
divided, and fringed with minute silky hairs. The older
plants are of a darker hue, with a purplish shade in the
centre. This adds much to the beauty of its appearance,
and serves to distinguish this fine moss from the other
species.

The Hypnum splendens is, I think, of perennial
growth, as many specimens show the decayed fronds of
former years. I have counted as many as nine on the
same stem, besides the fresh green ones.

The capsules containing the sporules or seed appear
on long slender’ stems, not more than two at the base of
each of the fronds. This moss extends by roots as well
as by the seed.

The wood moss (Hypnum trignetram) is coarser
and more bushy, and though more striking in appear-
226 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

ance, is not wanting in the peculiar grace of outline
which is so attractive in Hypnum splendens.

It is somewhat remarkable that the larger and more
conspicuous plants of the moss tribe are less distin-
guished by their fruitage than the smaller ones, some of
which, lowly, tiny, insignificant as to size, attract the
eye by the bright array of shining capsules displaying
rich tints of red and brown, fawn or orange color. Very
lovely these tiny cups look contrasted with the various
shades of green, pale straw color, deep purplish-bronze,
grey, silvery-white, or whatever the prevailing color of
the moss may be.

There seems to be no end to the number and variety
of species of mosses that are to be found, whether in the
deep shade of the primeval forest, in swampy fens or
bogs, in the water, floating and waving as the wind
moves the surface, in the crevices of rocks where a little
soil sustains them, or on the rugged stone which they
clothe, as if to kindly hide the rough, bare surface.

No soil so barren, no desert so dry, but some kind of
moss will find a spot where it may grow and flourish,
take root and display its tufts of verdure, its rosy stems
and capsules.

Look at this forest of red stalks, each crowned with a
shining cap. The leaf is so minute you can hardly
distinguish it, but the fruit is bright and beautiful. The
soil is hard and arid, incapable of supporting anything
save this Red Moss (Ceratodon purpureus).
MOSSES AND LICHENS. 227

“‘Tt drinks heaven’s dew as blithe as rose
That in the King’s own garden grows.”

It has indeed a great capacity for moisture, rain, snow
and dew, which appears to be the only food of the
mosses that grow on desert lands. There is the tiny
Bryum argentewm, and others of the same genus, which
take possession of the least inviting soil, slate roofs, dry
thatch, sapless wood and hard clay banks where nothing

“else will grow.

All the species of this family are not so small. Some
are conspicuous for their fine coloring, such as the
Bryum rosewm, one not uncommonly met with in the
forest. Clusters of these may be found deeply nested
in old decayed logs among a variety of Hypnuwms and
Dicranums. Their deep green leafy rosettes, in shape
like miniature roses, form a decided contrast to the
sister mosses and grey lichens, and if it chance to be the
fruiting season, there is an added charm in the varied
colors ; for rising from the cap-like centre of the crown
of the plant are from three to five hair-like stems about
an inch in height, of a reddish color, almost semi-
transparent, bearing a capsule blunt on the apex and a
little curved downward at the neck. This cap is orange-
red, and looks as if it were a chalice filled to the brim
with some choice wine or amber-tinted fluid.

This curious vessel is closely sealed by a lid which,
when the contents are ripe, is lifted and the fine seed or
sporules are poured out. This fruitful Bryum is sexsile,
228 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.
y

grows close to the ground, and extends largely by means
of its root-stalk, which sends up many shoots, each bud
forming a little leafy deep green cup.

A singularly handsome, tree-like variety is the Palm-
Tree Moss (Climaciwm Americanum), but it is not a
member of the Bryum family, being distinct from it both
in habit and appearance. :

The appropriate name of Palm Tree Moss is derived
from its plumy head; the stem is often more than an
inch high, bearing on its summit a drooping crown of
elegant feathery fronds, from the midst of which ascend
slender thready stalks bearing the long cylindrical pale-
red capsules.

When growing in the rich damp soil of the shady
woods the full-grown specimens are bright green, but in
wet spongy places, exposed to the rays of the sun, the
plants take a bronze color, are stunted and thick-set,
and have not the graceful appearance of those nurtured
in the forest.

One of the most elegant of the somewhat stiffly grow-
ing mosses is the Dicranum secundum, which is of a
slenderer habit than the Dicranum. scoparium. In it
the hair-like leafage is more scattered and borne on one
side only. There are many species, and they are to be
found in many places: some in damp woodlands, on logs,
or on the ground; some on gneiss rocks and hillsides,
forming thick level beds of velvety green, very bright
and lovely, the dark capsules giving a fringe-like grace
MOSSES AND LICHENS. 229

to the moss, relieving its uniformity and adding to the
general effect: |

On bare rugged rocks, dead wood and barren soil, a
patch of silvery brightness catches the eye, and involun-
tarily we stop a moment to inspect one of the hardy
little mosses of the wayside, the Bryum argenteum. It
is so named from its silvery sheen, the brightness of its
tiny capsules and the minuteness of its very inconspicu-
ous foliage. It is the very least of the Bryums, yet the
most fruitful; the little silvery caps are so close together
that they form a shining host, and many a rugged spot
is adorned and made attractive by them. :

Perhaps it was some such insignificant moss as our
Bryum argentewm that brought strength and comfort
to the weary heart of the lonely African missionary,
Mungo Park. Alone in the desert, despairing of all
human aid, he had sunk down, and like the Hebrew
prophet of old was ready to cry out, “It is better to die
than to live!” when his eye chanced to rest upon a little
plant, beside him, and attracted by its beauty, he argued
thus. within himself: “If the great Creator has thus
_ preserved and nourished this little. plant with the dew
from heaven, and protected its helpless form so frail
_ from injury, will He not also care for one for whom
Christ died?” and rising from the arid desert he once
more pursued his journey, strengthened by the sight of
that simple desert plant.

When. these, hardy. little Hypnums and Brywms
16
230 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

decay, they leave to their successors a sandy soil, part
of which has been won from the hard rock on which
they had found an abiding-place, their tiny, wedge-like
roots having forced apart the surface of the limestone
or gneiss rock, taking to themselves minute particles of
the sterner material, thus forcing its strength to yield to
their weakness. This is another proof of the wisdom of
the Almighty God, who “ willeth the weak things of the
world and those that have no power to overcome the
strong, and the base things of the world and the things
that are ae hath He chosen to bring to nought
things that are.” :

Look now at this beautiful Feather Moss (Hypnum
tamariscinum). Each frond is like a green plume,
hence its descriptive name. Like Hypnum splendens
it seems to be perennial, as may be inferred from the
rather wiry stem bearing many divisions in the form of
branchlets.

The plants of the first year’s growth are single fronds,
not branched, and it is the older and more matured
that bear the long slender fruit-stalk and fine capsules
containing the seed. There are seldom more than two
to each of the lower pairs of leafy divisions. This
species increases more by roots than by seed, as is the
ease with many of the larger mosses, and retains its
color well when pressed and mounted in the herbarium.

I consider the most satisfactory method of preserving
the mosses is to wash them thoroughly, no matter how
MOSSES AND LICHENS. 231

you do it—squeeze them well (they are very elastic and
come all right however roughly you handle them); then
pick out such pieces as you wish to preserve, press the
moisture from them with rag or blotting paper, old
towel or any soft thing of the kind, and when pretty
well dried, with a small brush and 4 little paste arrange
them in a blank book or album of good stout paper.
Always obtain the seed vessels, if possible, as it is by
this particular organ of fructification that the family
and different species are recognized.

A well-arranged book of mosses becomes a charming
thing to inspect, and if the collector is fortunate in
having a friend who is a botanist and who will help
him to name his specimens, he will have a treasure-book
of very lovely objects to remind him of pleasant times
spent in forest, swamp or field—a memento of wayside
wanderings:of days gone by, when the discovery of some
new plant or moss or lichen was a source of pure and
innocent delight, unalloyed by the experiences and cares
of after-life among his fellowmen in the hurry and
strife of the busy world.
THE INDIAN MOSS-BAG.

BESIDES the use which is made of the white peat moss
by the nurserymen and the gardeners, there is one which
I will describe, as it will be new to those of my readers
who are not acquainted with the interior of the North-
West Indians’ wigwams, and the way the Indian mothers
nurse and care for their babies.

The Indian moss-bag takes the place of the cot or
cradle—I might add, of the rocking-chair, also, so
indispensable in our nurseries. It is simply formed of
a piece of cloth, or more usually of dressed doe-skin,
about two feet in length, shaped wider at the upper part
and narrower below. The sides are pierced with holes.
in order that they may be laced together with a leather
thong. On this skin is laid a soft bed of the dried moss,
and the papoose (the Indian name for baby) is placed
upon it, its hands and arms carefully disposed at its
sides and the little legs and feet straight down and
wrapped in a bit of fur, so that the tiny toes can feel no
cold. The end of the bag is then folded over at the
other end, turned up and the sides laced together.
THE INDIAN MOSS-BAG. 233

Nothing of baby is seen but its face and head. The
black head and bead-like black eyes look very funny
peering out of the moss-bag. I forgot to mention that
care is taken to support the back of the babe’s head by
a pillow of the moss, the back portion of the bag being
left a little higher than the front for that purpose.

A strong loop of braided bark or of finely-cut strips
of doe-skin is attached to the moss-bhag, by which the
primitive cradle may be suspended to the branch of a
tree or to a peg in the wall of the lodge or house, cr be
passed over the mother’s forehead when travelling or
moving from place to place with the child on her back.

The infant seems perfectly at ease and contented.
Of course, it is released at times during the day and
allowed to stretch its limbs on its mother’s lap or on the
floor of the lodge, where a blanket or skin of some wild
animal is spread for it to lie upon.

_ So accustomed are the children to this original cradle-
bed that when able to creep they will voluntarily
seek for it and dispose themselves to sleep, fretting if
debarred from being put to rest in it.

Not only is this papoose cradle in use among the
Indians, but in the nurseries of the white settlers as
well, and great taste and skill is shown in the material
of which they are made. Beautiful patterns in needle-
work are wrought with silk, moose hair and beads by
the ladies of the Hudson Bay Company to ornament
their moss-bags.
| 234 | PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

When older, the arms of the children are allowed
to be free, and great care is taken to keep the little
ones bright and happy.

The North-West papoose cradles are much better
than those of our Ontario Indians, which are generally ‘
made of thin board or bark, while any sort of rags or
blanket forms the bed for the babe. The squaw, when
entering a house, will just slip the loop from her head
and stick the cradle up against the wall, with very little
care for the’ poor prisoner, who rarely cries, but peeps
out from its shock of black hair perfectly contented to
remain a silent spectator of the novelties by which it
may be surrounded.

The mother often has a pad attached to the strap of
the cradle, to prevent its sharp edges hurting her fore-
head when carrying the child in this way.

Now, it strikes me that our British ancestry may
have been nursed in just. such a fashion as that of
the North-West Indian moss-bag. You know the old
nursery lullaby song :

‘*Rock-a-by, baby, on the tree-top,
When the wind blows the cradle will rock,

When the bough breaks the cradle will fall,
Then down comes cradle and baby and all.”

This ditty is as old as any of the ancient chronicles,
handed down from age to age verbatim by nursing
mothers of ancient days, a history in rhyme of how our

ancestors were cradled.
SOMETHING GATHERS UP THE
~ FRAGMENTS.

‘‘ Something gathers up the fragments, and nothing is lost.”

—Fourcrois’ Chemistry.
THESE striking words, so suggestive of the wise economy
of the great Creator of the universe, are simply a para-
phrase of the words of the! Lord Jesus given to His
disciples after the miraculous feast of the hungry
multitude on the grassy slopes of Palestine, “Gather up
the broken pieces which remain over and above, that
nothing be lost” (John vi. 13, Revised Version)—words
which we are apt to read without entering fully into
their meaning.

We think only of their obvious import that no waste
of provisions should be allowed, that even the fragments
should be gathered up and made use of for ourselves or
for the poor, but the old French chemist’s eyes were
opened to see a wider and deeper meaning in the Lord’s

words.
236 PEARLS AND PEBBLES,

He saw that in Nature, from the greatest to the
smallest thing, there isno waste. Unseen and unnoticed
by us, every atom has its place and its part to fulfil.
Nothing is lost. In God’s economy we trace this fact
everywhere.

The waves of the mighty ocean are kept back by the
atoms of sand worn down from the lofty hills and rocks
by the action of the winds and rains and frosts of past
ages. The minute particles are brought down by melted
snows of the avalanche to the rivers, and by the rivers
to the seas. The ocean waves bear these sands, mingled
with their waters, to lay them softly down on the shore,
there to form a barrier against their own encroachments,
unconsciously fulfilling the dictates of their mighty
Creator’s command, “ Hitherto shalt thou come, but no
further; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed.” ,

Atom by atom were the lofty hills built up; atom by
atom are they laid low. By slow but constant action
they perform the great work of keeping back the
advance of the mighty waves of the ocean and forming
new land.

Chemistry presents many wonderful examples of the
changes effected by certain combinations known to the
scientific searchers into the mysteries of Nature, but such
things are out of the sphere of my limited knowledge.

Let us rather go into the forests, where we may realize,
not less forcibly, the truth of the words, “ Something
gathers up the fragments, and nothing is lost.”
SOMETHING GATHERS UP THE FRAGMENTS. 237

The depths of the forest present to the eye of the
traveller a scene of tangled confusion. Here fallen
trees, with upturned roots, lie prostrate on the ground ;
branchless, leafless, decaying trunks, unsightly to the
eye; beds of blackened leaves; shattered boughs,
whitened and grey with fungous growth; naked stems
ready to fall, their barkless wood graven with many
fantastic traceries, the work of the various insect larvee
that have sheltered therein their nurseries while the
tree was yet living and strong. A thousand forms of
vegetable life are below, filling up the vacant places of
the soil.

In the silence of that lonely leafy wilderness there is
active, sentient life—nothing is idle, nothing stands still ;
instead of waste and confusion we shall find all these
things are working out the will of the Creator.

‘* Disorder—order unperceived by thee ;
All chance—direction which thou canst not see.”

Here lies one of the old giants of the forest at our
feet. Take heed how you step upon it. By its huge
size and the pile of rifted bark beside it one judges it
must have had a growth of two hundred years, drinking
in the rain and the dews, and being fed by the gases’
that float unseen in the atmosphere. The earth had
sustained it year after year, giving strength and support
to the mighty trunk from its store of mineral substance
through the network of cable-like roots and fibres
238 : PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

Never idle were those vegetable miners, always digging
materials from the dark earth to add power and sub-
stance to the tree, hour by hour building up its wonder-
ful structure, taking and selecting only such particles as
were suited to increase the woody fibre and add to the
particular qualities of the tree, whether it be oak, or ash,
or maple, or the majestic pine.

But while the tree had been receiving, it had also
year by year been giving back to earth and air, in an
altered state, something that it did not require for itself.
It had given back to the earth fresh matter, in the form
of leaves, decayed branches and effete bark and fruitful
seed. It had purified and changed the gases that it had
first inhaled, and deprived them of the properties that
were injurious to animal life. Something had gathered
up the fragments that had been thrown off; there had
been change, but not loss.

Now, let us look more closely at the surface of this
fallen tree as it lies before us, a cumberer of the
ground.

It is covered with variegated mosses, soft as piled
velvet, but far more lovely. Here on the mouldering
old wood are miniature forests, Hypnums, Dicranums,
Bryums, with many lichens of the tenderest hues, grey,
yellow or brown deepening to red, and, it may be, some
brilliant fungus of gorgeous scarlet or cardinal red, fawn
or gold, exquisite in form or in coloring, contrasting
richly with the green of the mosses.
SOMETHING GATHERS UP THE FRAGMENTS. 239

Possibly some reader will raise the question, Of
what service can all these decaying trees and their cov-
rings of mosses, lichens and fungi be to man? They
have their uses,.as we shall find if we examine the sub-

_ ject more closely, and notice the effects produced.

The floating germs of vegetable life, the seeds or
spores of the lichens and mosses, falling on the surface
of the fallen timber, find a soil suited to the peculiar
requirements and development of their organisms.
These minute vegetable growths are similar to those
seen growing upon old rails and stumps and dry walls,
and which anyone ignorant of their nature might think
part of the substance to which they adhere, instead
of living plants as the cryptograms all are. Simple
plants, representing the earlier forms of vegetation in
the world’s history, worthy are they of reverence and
adoration. These and others like them might be called
the grey fathers of the vegetable kingdom.

As the lichens decay they give place to the mosses,
and these, as they increase, send down their wedge-
like roots between the fissures of the bark, penetrating
into the tissue of the wood, already softened by the
‘decomposition of the former occupants. The dew, the
showers, the frosts and snows of winter, falling’ upon
the sponge-like mosses, fill them with moisture, in-
vigorate them and increase them till they form thick
mats that hide the surface of the wood.

Some of these mosses, as we have seen, are not mere
240 PEARLS AND PEBBLES.

annuals, but, like the Hypnum splendens and others.
among the hair-cap mosses, are perennial.

Let us raise the thick mat of velvety mosses that are.
so minute and so closely packed. It presents a uniform
smooth surface, and it seems a pity to disturb it in its.
beauty, but we would look beneath and see what its
work has been during the past years.

A bed of rich black friable mould, the residue of the.
annual decomposition of these tiny mosses, meets the
eye; below that mould we find layers of decaying wood,
a loose network of fibrous matter. The cellular tissues.
have disappeared, and with the least pressure of hand
or foot the whole fabric falls into a powdery mass.

The very heart of the wood has yielded up its strength
and hardness under the influences of the agencies brought
to bear upon it. A few more years and that fallen tree
will be no more seen., The once mighty tree, with the
mosses and lichens alike, will have returned their sub-
stance to Mother Earth. ‘Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”

The little plants that penetrated to the heart of the.
vegetable giant of the woods have done their work, and.
are no more needed. The gases have been set free and
restored to the atmosphere.

Let us sum up the work and see its results. The
elements and the wood of the tree have fed the lichens.
and mosses. The mosses have been a warm sheltering
home for myriads of insect larvee, which have gathered.
up many fragments during their infant state, all tending:
SOMETHING GATHERS UP THE FRAGMENTS. 241

to reduce the wood to the earthy condition which
should enter into other forms. Then comes man, a
Settler in the forest wilderness, a stranger and an
emigrant from a far-off land. Coming to make himself
a home, he must cut down the living trees and clear the
ground with axe and fire. He sows the wheat and corn
upon the rich black vegetable mould, but he may not
‘think that he owes much of its fertility to the unseen,
insignificant agents that for unnumbered ages, under
the direction of the infinite God, have been preparing
‘the ground to receive the grain for the life-sustaining
bread for himself and his children.

Thus we see that by the heavenly Father’s order,
“Something gathers up the fragments, and nothing is
lost.” ;

“Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even
they shall understand the lovingkindness of the Lord.”
Psa. evii. 43.)

THE END.