Sitting in the pleasant shade of clustering thorns, I see nothing now that attracts me more than the leafy bowers of this curious vine. Every one has sprung boldly from the sod in full faith of finding the support it needs; at least, I see none that are standing quite alone. Two, it may be, but oftener three or four, have started at convenient distances, and, when well above the tallest grass, each has sought out the tendrils of its nearest neighbor and these have closely intertwined. So, here and there, we have a leafy arch, and scattered among them many a pretty bower. These may well have given the Indian a clew to wigwam-building. Had ever, in the distant past, a savage seen his child creep beneath the overarching branches of the despised “carrion-flower,” he would have seen how easily a summer shelter might be made. Perhaps upon some such hint the stuffy caves and rock-shelters were abandoned, for the time surely was when even a more primitive dwelling than a tent was man’s protection against the summer’s sun. And may not these mutually supporting vines have struck the fancy of some Indian poet? In the wigwams of these people, who but two centuries ago peopled these meadows and the surrounding hills, may not many a pretty tale have been told of these same despised carrion-flowers? Dyer states, in his charming Folk-Lore of Plants, how, “in the Servian folk-song, there grows out of the youth’s body a green fir, out of the maiden’s a red rose, which entwine together.” I should not wonder at learning that so too the Indian believed that from the bodies of braves, who had fallen together, fighting for the same cause, had sprung these intertwining vines that cling now so firmly to each other. Why, indeed, should not the tragedy of Tristram and Ysonde have been re-enacted on the Delaware meadows? But, though despised by man, this vigorous plant has hosts of other friends. The summer long, scores of bugs, butterflies, and beetles crowd about. Whether when in leaf only, or later when in bloom, or in autumn, when laden with its wealth of blue-black berries, it is never quite alone, and many of its attendants are fully as curious as the plant itself. One or more minute beetles prefer it to all other plants, yet not because of the peculiar odor. At least, the same creatures do not crowd decaying flesh. On the other hand, the dainty flies that linger about the ruddy phlox, the blue iris, and purple pentstemon tarry likewise about the carrion-flower and find it a pleasant place, if one may judge by the length of time they stay.