recognize the Plymouth May-flower, as soon as seen, by its wondrous
depth of color? Does it blush with triumph to see how Nature has
outwitted the Pilgrims, and even succeeded in preserving her deer like
an English duke, still maintaining the deepest woods in Massachusetts
precisely where those sturdy immigrants first began their clearings?

The Hepatica (called also Liverwort, Squirrel-Cup, or Blue Anemone) has
been found in Worcester as early as March seventeenth, and in Danvers on
March twelfth,--dates which appear almost the extreme of credibility.

Our next wild-flower in this region is the Claytonia, or Spring-Beauty,
which is common in the Middle States, but here found in only a few
localities. It is the Indian _Miskodeed_, and was said to have been
left behind when mighty Peboan, the Winter, was melted by the breath
of Spring. It is an exquisitely delicate little creature, bears its
blossoms in clusters, unlike most of the early species, and opens in
gradual succession each white and pink-veined bell. It grows in moist
places on the sunny edges of woods, and prolongs its shy career from
about the tenth of April until almost the end of May.

A week farther into April, and the Bloodroot opens,--a name of guilt,
and a type of innocence. This fresh and lovely thing appears to
concentrate all its stains within its ensanguined root, that it may
condense all purity in the peculiar whiteness of its petals. It emerges
from the ground with each shy blossom wrapt in its own pale-green leaf,
then doffs the cloak and spreads its long petals round a group of yellow
stamens. The flower falls apart so easily that when in full bloom it
will hardly bear transportation, but with a touch the stem stands naked,
a bare gold-tipped sceptre amid drifts of snow. And the contradiction
of its hues seems carried into its habits. One of the most shy of wild