fragrance. The sun, looking over the taller trees to the east, had
crowned the top of it with gold, so that it was beautiful to see; and it
was full of honey bees as excited as I.

A score of feet onward toward the wind, beyond the thorn-apple tree, I
passed wholly out of the range of its fragrance into another world, and
began trying for some new odour. After one or two false scents, for this
pursuit has all the hazards known to the hunter, I caught an odour long
known to me, not strong, nor yet very wonderful, but distinctive. It led
me still a little distance northward to a sunny slope just beyond a bit
of marsh, and, sure enough, I found an old friend, the wild sweet
geranium, a world of it, in full bloom, and I sat down there for some
time to enjoy it fully.

Beyond that, and across a field wild with tangles of huckleberry bushes
and sheep laurel where the bluets and buttercups were blooming, and in
shady spots the shy white violet, I searched for the odour of a certain
clump of pine trees I discovered long ago. I knew that I must come upon
it soon, but could not tell just when or where. I held up a moistened
finger to make sure of the exact direction of the wind, and bearing,
then, a little eastward, soon came full upon it--as a hunter might
surprise a deer in the forest. I crossed the brook a second time and
through a little marsh, making it the rule of the game never to lose for
an instant the scent I was following--even though I stopped in a low
spot to admire a mass of thrifty blue flags, now beginning to bloom--and
came thus to the pines I was seeking. They are not great trees, nor
noble, but gnarled and angular and stunted, for the soil in that place
is poor and thin, and the winds in winter keen; but the brown blanket of
needles they spread and the shade they offer the traveller are not less
hospitable; nor the fragrance they give off less enchanting. The odour