I had been on the trail for white Moccasin-Flowers for years; and on June
16th a lad of White Oaks Valley promised to guide me to the Forks of
Broad Brook, and show me a colony of absolutely White Lady’s Slippers.
We arrived at the junction of the Field Brook—where it crosses the White
Oaks Road near Richmond’s Farm—and turned our horse’s head through the
fields eastward along the rude loggers’ path travelled in winter. We
were obliged to cross fields of oats and potato vines in order to arrive
on the summit of these rounded hills. Here, amid the white birches and
sweet-fern bushes, we fastened our horse. Among these ferns and briars I
discovered five enormous orange-yellow mushrooms, which, apparently, were
of recent growth. They were gorgeous to behold, and smelled like new-made
bread, yet they were extremely poisonous. They were, upon examination,
found to spring from a socket, above which a ring encircled the stalk.
This is characteristic of genus _Amanita_ of this form of fungus. This
poisonous species with some susceptible people produces serious results
if only handled, or if its fragrance is inhaled. I collected three
specimens, however, and put them in my vasculum.
We now descended the slopes eastward leading to the Wilsey Lot, where
we found a road leading up through Broad Brook Valley to the Forks. The
path was bordered with tall, luxuriant brakes at least four feet high.
They were covered with dew, and brushing against them, we became wet
through. My guide was an alert observer, and darting off here and there
into the ravine, he brought forth gay blossoms of the Showy Queen of the
Moccasin-Flowers. As we proceeded, we came to a bend of the brook and
followed along high ledges of rock, where we crossed to the right over
the boulder-filled stream. A quarter of a mile more brought us to another
bend in the brook, and here we re-crossed, and at the left hand abruptly
climbed the hillside in the sphagnous bed of a rivulet. Here, my guide
said, were the Pure White Moccasin-Flowers. They proved to be pale pink
blossoms of the Showy Reginæ, however, and not, as I had hoped, the rarer
_Cypripedium candidum_, or even the albinos of _Cypripedium reginæ_.
It is said that in a swamp near the Forks both of the Yellow
Moccasin-Flowers bloom. American Mountain Laurel, the beautiful
Calico-bush, was in full bloom hereabout, so the day was not without some
new treasure found.
[Illustration: =The Mountain Laurel.= (_Kalmia latifolia._)
“_And all the rugged mountainside_
_Thro’ billowy curves is seen;_
_The roadsides meet in ample shade,_
_With showers of light and golden glooms,_
_And bubbling up the rocky ways_
_The clustered laurel blooms._”
ELAINE GOODALE.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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