Would You, Most Worthy
Friend, Like To See Some Of The Bright Gems Which Spring, Whilst Dallying
Over The Sequestered, Airy Heights And Swampy Marshes Of Our Woods Drops
Along Our Path?
Follow, then, sketch book and pencil in hand, the fairy
footsteps of one of the most amiable women which
Old England ever sent to
our climes, accompany the Countess of Dalhousie on a botanizing tour
through Sillery woods; you have her note book, if not herself, to go by.
For May, see what an ample store of bright flowers scattered around you;
fear not to lose yourself in thickets and underbrush; far from the beaten
track a noble lady has ransacked the environs over and over again,
sometimes alone, sometimes with an equally enthusiastic and intelligent
friend, who hailed from Woodfield; [243] sweet flowers and beautiful ferns
attract other noble ladies to this day in that wood. Are you anxious to
possess the first-born of spring? Whilst virgin snow still whitens the
fields, send a young friend to pluck for you, from the willow, its golden
catkins: -
"The first gilt thing
Decked with the earliest pearls of spring."
The Gomin Wood will, with the dawn of May, afford you materials for a
wreath, rich in perfume and wild in beauty. The quantity of wild flowers,
to be found in the environs of Quebec has called forth the following
remarks from one of Flora's most fervid votaries, a gentleman well known
in this locality: - "A stranger," says he, "landing in this country, is
much surprised to find the flowers which he has carefully cultivated in
his garden at home, growing wild at his feet. Such as dog-tooth violets,
trilliums and columbines. I was much excited when I discovered them for
the first time; the trillium, for which I had paid three shillings
and six-pence when in England, positively growing wild. I could scarcely
believe that I had a right to gather them; having paid so much for one, I
felt that it was property, valuable property running wild, and no one
caring to gather it. No one? Yes! some did, for we carried all that
we could find, and if the reader will stroll along the hedges on St. Lewis
road he will find them in abundance: dark purple flowers, growing on a
stalk naked to near the summit, where there is a whorl of three leaves,
its sepals are three, petals three, stamens twice three, and its stigmas
three, hence its name of trillium. We have a few of the white varieties.
After the purple trillium has done flowering, we have the painted
trillium of the woods; the trillium grandiflorum is abundant at Grosse
Isle. The dog-tooth violet early arrested my attention; the spotted leaves
and the bright yellow flowers, fully recurved in the bright sunshine,
contrasted beautifully with the fresh green grass on the banks on which
they are usually found, the bulbs are deep-seated, and the plant will at
once, from the general appearance of the flower, be recognized as
belonging to the lily family.
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