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 Form No. 513 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2011 with funding from 
 
 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hil 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/thousandmilewalkmuir 
 
ILarge^aper C&ttton 
 
 A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 to the Gulf 
 
A Florida Sunset 
 From a water-color by Amelia M. Watson 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 to the Gulf 
 
 By 
 "John Muir 
 
 
 
 Boston and New York 
 
 Houghton Mifflin Company 
 
 ipi6 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 FIVE HUNDRED AND FIFTY COPIES 
 OF THIS LARGE-PAPER EDITION 
 WERE PRINTED AT THE RIVERSIDE 
 PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, IN OCTOBER, 1916. 
 FIVE HUNDRED COPIES ARE FOR 
 SALE. THIS IS NUMBER JtfcT 
 
Contents 
 
 Introduction ix 
 
 I. Kentucky Forests and Caves i 
 
 II. Crossing the Cumberland Mountains . . . 17 
 
 III. Through the River Country of Georgia ... 47 
 
 IV. Camping among the Tombs 66 
 
 V. Through Florida Swamps and Forests .... 83 
 
 VI. Cedar Keys 123 
 
 VII. A Sojourn in Cuba 143 
 
 VIII. By a Crooked Route to California . . . .169 
 
 IX. Twenty Hill Hollow 192 
 
 Index 213 
 
 501330 
 
Illustrations 
 
 A Florida Sunset . Hand-colored Photogravure Frontispiece 
 
 From a water-color by Miss Amelia M. Watson 
 
 John Muir about 1870 x 
 
 From a photograph by Bradley fif Rulofson, San Francisco, Cal. 
 
 Inside Cover and First Pace of Mr. Muir's Journal 
 of his Walk to the Gulf xviii 
 
 From the original 
 
 Map showing Route of Walk • 1 
 
 Kentucky Oaks 2 
 
 From a photograph by Theodore Eitel 
 Entrance to Mammoth Cave 12 
 
 From a photograph. By courtesy of the Louisville and Nashville 
 Railroad 
 
 Pages 18 and 19 of the Journal, with Sketch of 
 Meeting with the Old Tennessee Farmer . ao 
 
 From the original 
 
 The Clinch River, Tennessee 30 
 
 From a photograph. By courtesy of the Louisville and Nashville 
 Railroad 
 
 A Southern Pine 54 
 
 From a photograph by Herbert W. Gleason 
 Spanish Moss (Tillandsia) 58 
 
 From a photograph by Herbert W. Gleason 
 
 In Bonaventure Cemetery, Savannah .... 68 
 
 From a photograph by Herbert W. Gleason 
 
 By the St. John's River in Eastern Florida ... 90 
 
 From a photograph by Herbert W. Gleason 
 
 [vii] 
 
Illustrations 
 
 A Florida Palmetto Hummock, or "Hammock" . 114 
 
 From a photograph by Herbert K. jfob 
 
 Page of Journal with Sketch showing Palmettos in 
 Different Stages of Development . . . .118 
 
 From the original 
 
 A Shell Mound at Cedar Keys, Florida . . .126 
 
 From a photograph by A. J. Smith 
 
 Lime Key 134 
 
 From Mr. Muir's sketch in the original journal 
 
 Morro Castle and Entrance to Havana Harbor . 148 
 
 From a photograph 
 
 Twenty Hill Hollow, Merced County, California . 194 
 
 From a sketch by Mr. Muir 
 
Introduction 
 
 JOHN MUIR, Earth-planet, Universe."— 
 These words are written on the inside 
 cover of the notebook from which the con- 
 tents of this volume have been taken. They 
 reflect the mood in which the late author and 
 explorer undertook his thousand-mile walk to 
 the Gulf of Mexico a half-century ago. No less 
 does this refreshingly cosmopolitan address, 
 which might have startled any finder of the 
 book, reveal the temper and the comprehen- 
 siveness of Mr. Muir's mind. He never was and 
 never could be a parochial student of nature. 
 Even at the early age of twenty-nine his eager 
 interest in every aspect of the natural world had 
 made him a citizen of the universe. 
 
 While this was by far the longest botanical 
 excursion which Mr. Muir made in his earlier 
 years, it was by no means the only one. He 
 had botanized around the Great Lakes, in 
 Ontario, and through parts of Wisconsin, 
 [ix] 
 
Introduction 
 
 Indiana, and Illinois. On these expeditions he 
 had disciplined himself to endure hardship, 
 for his notebooks disclose the fact that he often 
 went hungry and slept in the woods, or on the 
 open prairies, with no cover except the clothes 
 he wore. 
 
 "Oftentimes," he writes in some unpublished 
 biographical notes, "I had to sleep out with- 
 out blankets, and also without supper or break- 
 fast. But usually I had no great difficulty in 
 finding a loaf of bread in the widely scattered 
 clearings of the farmers. With one of these big 
 backwoods loaves I was able to wander many 
 a long, wild mile, free as the winds in the glori- 
 ous forests and bogs, gathering plants and feed- 
 ing on God's abounding, inexhaustible spiritual 
 beauty bread. Only once in my long Canada 
 wanderings was the deep peace of the wilder- 
 ness savagely broken. It happened in the maple 
 woods about midnight, when I was cold and my 
 fire was low. I was awakened by the awfully 
 dismal howling of the wolves, and got up in 
 haste to replenish the fire." 
 [x] 
 
JOHN MUIR ABOUT 1870 
 
Introduction 
 
 It was not, therefore, a new species of ad- 
 venture upon which Mr. Muir embarked when 
 he started on his Southern foot-tour. It was 
 only a new response to the lure of those favor- 
 ite studies which he had already pursued over 
 uncounted miles of virgin Western forests and 
 prairies. Indeed, had it not been for the acci- 
 dental injury to his right eye in the month of 
 March, 1867, he probably would have started 
 somewhat earlier than he did. In a letter writ- 
 ten to Indianapolis friends on the day after the 
 accident, he refers mournfully to the interrup- 
 tion of a long-cherished plan. "For weeks," 
 he writes, "I have daily consulted maps in lo- 
 cating a route through the Southern States, the 
 West Indies, South America, and Europe — a 
 botanical journey studied for years. And so my 
 mind has long been in a glow with visions of the 
 glories of a tropical flora; but, alas, I am half 
 blind. My right eye, trained to minute analy- 
 sis, is lost and I have scarce heart to open the 
 other. Had this journey been accomplished, 
 the stock of varied beauty acquired would have 
 [ xi 1 
 
Introduction 
 
 made me willing to shrink into any corner of 
 the world, however obscure and however re- 
 mote." 
 
 The injury to his eye proved to be less serious 
 than he had at first supposed. In June he was 
 writing to a friend: "I have been reading and 
 botanizing for some weeks, and find that for 
 such work I am not very much disabled. I leave 
 this city [Indianapolis] for home to-morrow, 
 accompanied by Merrill Moores, a little friend 
 of mine. We will go to Decatur, Illinois, thence 
 northward through the wide prairies, botaniz- 
 ing a few weeks by the way. ... I hope to go 
 South towards the end of the summer, and as 
 this will be a journey that I know very little 
 about, I hope to profit by your counsel before 
 setting out." 
 
 In an account written after the excursion he 
 says: "I was eager to see Illinois prairies on my 
 way home, so we went to Decatur, near the 
 center of the State, thence north [to Portage] 
 by Rockford and Janesville. I botanized one 
 week on the prairie about seven miles south- 
 [ xii] 
 
Introduction 
 
 west of Pecatonica. ... To me all plants are 
 more precious than before. My poor eye is not 
 better, nor worse. A cloud is over it, but in 
 gazing over the widest landscapes, I am not 
 always sensible of its presence." 
 
 By the end of August Mr. Muir was back 
 again in Indianapolis. He had found it con- 
 venient to spend a "botanical week" among 
 his University friends in Madison. So keen 
 was his interest in plants at this time that an 
 interval of five hours spent in Chicago was 
 promptly turned to account in a search for 
 them. "I did not find many plants in her tu- 
 multuous streets," he complains; "only a few 
 grassy plants of wheat, and two or three species 
 of weeds, — amaranth, purslane, carpet-weed, 
 etc., — the weeds, I suppose, for man to walk 
 upon, the wheat to feed him. I saw some 
 green algae, but no mosses. Some of the latter 
 I expected to see on wet walls, and in seams on 
 the pavements. But I suppose that the manu- 
 facturers' smoke and the terrible noise are too 
 great for the hardiest of them. I wish I knew 
 [ xiii ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 where I was going. Doomed to be 'carried of 
 the spirit into the wilderness/ I suppose. I 
 wish I could be more moderate in my desires, 
 but I cannot, and so there is no rest." 
 
 The letter noted above was written only two 
 days before he started on his long walk to 
 Florida. If the concluding sentences still re- 
 flect indecision, they also convey a hint of the 
 overmastering impulse under which he was 
 acting. The opening sentences of his journal, 
 afterwards crossed out, witness to this sense of 
 inward compulsion which he felt." Few bodies," 
 he wrote, "are inhabited by so satisfied a soul 
 that they are allowed exemption from extra- 
 ordinary exertion through a whole life." After 
 reciting illustrations of nature's periodicity, of 
 the ebbs and flows of tides, and the pulsation 
 of other forces, visible and invisible, he observes 
 that " so also there are tides not only in the af- 
 fairs of men, but in the primal thing of life it- 
 self. In some persons the impulse, being slight, 
 is easily obeyed or overcome. But in others it 
 is constant and cumulative in action until its 
 [ xiv 1 
 
Introduction 
 
 power is sufficient to overmaster all impedi- 
 ments, and to accomplish the full measure of its 
 demands. For many a year I have been im- 
 pelled toward the Lord's tropic gardens of the 
 South. Many influences have tended to blunt 
 or bury this constant longing, but it has out- 
 lived and overpowered them all." 
 
 Muir's love of nature was so largely a part 
 of his religion that he naturally chose Biblical 
 phraseology when he sought a vehicle for his 
 feelings. No prophet of old could have taken 
 his call more seriously, or have entered upon 
 his mission more frevently. During the long 
 days of his confinement in a dark room he had 
 opportunity for much reflection. He concluded 
 that life was too brief and uncertain, and time 
 too precious, to waste upon belts and saws ; that 
 while he was pottering in a wagon factory, God 
 was making a world ; and he determined that, 
 if his eyesight was spared, he would devote the 
 remainder of his life to a study of the process. 
 Thus the previous bent of his habits and studies, 
 and the sobering thoughts induced by one of the 
 [ xv ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 bitterest experiences of his life, combined to 
 send him on the long journey recorded in these 
 pages. 
 
 Some autobiographical notes found among 
 his papers furnish interesting additional de- 
 tails about the period between his release from 
 the dark room and his departure for the South. 
 "As soon as I got out into heaven's light," he 
 says, "I started on another long excursion, 
 making haste with all my heart to store my 
 mind with the Lord's beauty, and thus be ready 
 for any fate, light or dark. And it was from 
 this time that my long, continuous wanderings 
 may be said to have fairly commenced. I bade 
 adieu to mechanical inventions, determined to 
 devote the rest of my life to the study of the 
 inventions of God. I first went home to Wis- 
 consin, botanizing by the way, to take leave of 
 my father and mother, brothers and sisters, all 
 of whom were still living near Portage. I also 
 visited the neighbors I had known as a boy, 
 renewed my acquaintance with them after an 
 absence of several years, and bade each a formal 
 [ xvi ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 good-bye. When they asked where I was going 
 I said, 'Oh! I don't know — just anywhere in 
 the wilderness, southward. I have already had 
 glorious glimpses of the Wisconsin, Iowa, Mich- 
 igan, Indiana, and Canada wildernesses; now 
 I propose to go South and see something of the 
 vegetation of the warm end of the country, and 
 if possible to wander far enough into South 
 America to see tropical vegetation in all its 
 palmy glory/ 
 
 "The neighbors wished me well, advised me 
 to be careful of my health, and reminded 
 me that the swamps in the South were full of 
 malaria. I stopped overnight at the home of 
 an old Scotch lady who had long been my friend 
 and was now particularly motherly in good 
 wishes and advice. I told her that as I was 
 sauntering along the road, just as the sun was 
 going down, I heard a darling speckled-breast 
 sparrow singing, 'The day 's done, the day 's 
 done/ 'Weel, John, my dear laddie/ she re- 
 plied, 'your day will never be done. There is 
 no end to the kind of studies you like so well, 
 [ xvii ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 but there's an end to mortals' strength of body 
 and mind, to all that mortals can accomplish. 
 You are sure to go on and on, but I want you 
 to remember the fate of Hugh Miller.' She was 
 one of the finest examples I ever knew of a kind, 
 generous, great-hearted Scotchwoman." 
 
 The formal leave-taking from family and 
 neighbors indicates his belief that he was part- 
 ing from home and friends for a long time. On 
 Sunday, the ist of September, 1867, Mr. Muir 
 said good-bye also to his Indianapolis friends, 
 and went by rail to JefTersonville, where he 
 spent the night. The next morning he crossed 
 the river, walked through Louisville, and 
 struck southward through the State of Ken- 
 tucky. A letter written a week later "among 
 the hills of Bear Creek, seven miles southeast 
 of Burkesville, Kentucky," shows that he had 
 covered about twenty-five miles a day. "I 
 walked from Louisville," he says, "a distance 
 of one hundred and seventy miles, and my feet 
 are sore. But, oh ! I am paid for all my toil a 
 thousand times over. I am in the woods on a 
 [ xviii ] 
 
oh 
 
 Wo 
 
 q h 
 
 - -1; 
 
 
 Q £ 
 2 fa 
 
 <o 
 
 > 
 
 o 
 
Introduction 
 
 hilltop with my back against a moss-clad log. 
 I wish you could see my last evening's bed- 
 room. The sun has been among the tree-tops 
 for more than an hour; the dew is nearly all 
 taken back, and the shade in these hill basins 
 is creeping away into the unbroken strongholds 
 of the grand old forests. 
 
 "I have enjoyed the trees and scenery of 
 Kentucky exceedingly. How shall I ever tell 
 of the miles and miles of beauty that have been 
 flowing into me in such measure ? These lofty 
 curving ranks of lobing, swelling hills, these 
 concealed valleys of fathomless verdure, and 
 these lordly trees with the nursing sunlight 
 glancing in their leaves upon the outlines of the 
 magnificent masses of shade embosomed among 
 their wide branches — these are cut into my 
 memory to go with me forever. 
 
 "I was a few miles south of Louisville when 
 I planned my journey. I spread out my map 
 under a tree and made up my mind to go 
 through Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia 
 to Florida, thence to Cuba, thence to some part 
 [ xlx ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 of South America; but it will be only a hasty 
 walk. I am thankful, however, for so much. 
 My route will be through Kingston and Madi- 
 sonville, Tennessee, and through Blairsville 
 and Gainesville, Georgia. Please write me 
 at Gainesville. I am terribly letter-hungry. I 
 hardly dare to think of home and friends." 
 ; In editing the journal I have endeavored, by 
 use of all the available evidence, to trail Mr. 
 Muir as closely as possible on maps of the sixties 
 as well as on the most recent state and topo- 
 graphical maps. The one used by him has not 
 been found, and probably is no longer in exist- 
 ence. Only about twenty-two towns and cities 
 are mentioned in his journal. This constitutes 
 a very small number when one considers the 
 distance he covered. Evidently he was so ab- 
 sorbed in the plant life of the region traversed 
 that he paid no heed to towns, and perhaps 
 avoided them wherever possible. 
 
 The sickness which overtook him in Florida 
 was probably of a malarial kind, although he 
 describes it under different names. It was, no 
 [«] 
 
Introduction 
 
 doubt, a misfortune in itself, and a severe test 
 for his vigorous constitution. But it was also a 
 blessing in disguise, inasmuch as it prevented 
 him from carrying out his foolhardy plan of 
 penetrating the tropical jungles of South 
 America along the Andes to a tributary of the 
 Amazon, and then floating down the river on 
 a raft to the Atlantic. As readers of the jour- 
 nal will perceive, he clung to this intention even 
 during his convalescence at Cedar Keys and in 
 Cuba. In a letter dated the 8th of Novem- 
 ber he describes himself as "just creeping about 
 getting plants and strength after my fever." 
 Then he asks his correspondent to direct let- 
 ters to New Orleans, Louisiana. "I shall have 
 to go there," he writes, "for a boat to South 
 America. I do not yet know to which point in 
 South America I had better go." His hope to 
 find there a boat for South America explains 
 an otherwise mystifying letter in which he re- 
 quested his brother David to send him a cer- 
 tain sum of money by American Express order 
 to New Orleans. As a matter of fact he did not 
 I xxi ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 go into Louisiana at all, either because he 
 learned that no south-bound ship was avail- 
 able at the mouth of the Mississippi, or because 
 the unexpected appearance of the Island Belle 
 in the harbor of Cedar Keys caused him to 
 change his plans* 
 
 In later years Mr. Muir himself strongly 
 disparaged the wisdom of his plans with respect 
 to South America, as may be seen in the chap- 
 ter that deals with his Cuban sojourn. The 
 judgment there expressed was lead-penciled 
 into his journal during a reading of it long after- 
 wards. Nevertheless the Andes and the South 
 American forests continued to fascinate his 
 imagination, as his letters show, for many years 
 after he came to California. When the long de- 
 ferred journey to South America was finally 
 made in 191 1, forty-four years after the first 
 attempt, he whimsically spoke of it as the ful- 
 fillment of those youthful dreams that moved 
 him to undertake his thousand-mile walk to 
 the Gulf. 
 
 Mr. Muir always recalled with gratitude the 
 
 [ xxii ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 Florida friends who nursed him through his 
 long and serious illness. In 1898, while travel- 
 ing through the South on a forest-inspection 
 tour with his friend Charles Sprague Sargent, 
 he took occasion to revisit the scenes of his early 
 adventures. It may be of interest to quote 
 some sentences from letters written at that 
 time to his wife and to his sister Sarah. "I 
 have been down the east side of the Florida 
 peninsula along the Indian River," he writes, 
 "through the palm and pine forests to Miami, 
 and thence to Key West and the southmost 
 keys stretching out towards Cuba. Returning, 
 I crossed over to the west coast by Palatka to 
 Cedar Keys, on my old track made thirty-one 
 years ago, in search of the Hodgsons who 
 nursed me through my long attack of fever. 
 Mr. Hodgson died long ago, also the eldest 
 son, with whom I used to go boating among 
 the keys while slowly convalescing." 
 
 He then tells how he found Mrs. Hodgson 
 and the rest of the family at Archer. They had 
 long thought him dead and were naturally very 
 
 [ xxiii ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 much surprised to see him. Mrs. Hodgson was 
 in her garden and he recognized her, though 
 the years had altered her appearance. Let us 
 give his own account of the meeting: "I asked 
 her if she knew me. 'No, I don't/ she said; 
 'tell me your name.' 'Muir,' I replied. 'John 
 Muir? My California John Muir?' she almost 
 screamed. I said, 'Yes, John Muir; and you 
 know I promised to return and visit you in 
 about twenty-five years, and though I am a 
 little late — six or seven years — I 've done 
 the best I could.' The eldest boy and girl re- 
 membered the stories I told them, and when 
 they read about the Muir Glacier they felt sure 
 it must have been named for me. I stopped at 
 Archer about four hours, and the way we talked 
 over old times you may imagine." From Sa- 
 vannah, on the same trip, he wrote: "Here is 
 where I spent a hungry, weary, yet happy week 
 camping in Bonaventure graveyard thirty-one 
 years ago. Many changes, I am told, have 
 been made in its graves and avenues of late, and 
 how many in my life!" 
 
 [ xxiv ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 In perusing this journal the reader will miss 
 the literary finish which Mr. Muir was accus- 
 tomed to give to his later writings. This fact 
 calls for no excuse. Not only are we dealing 
 here with the earliest product of his pen, but 
 with impressions and observations written down 
 hastily during pauses in his long march. He ap- 
 parently intended to use this raw material at 
 some time for another book. If the record, as 
 it stands, lacks finish and adornment, it also 
 possesses the immediacy and the freshness of 
 first impressions. 
 
 The sources which I have used in preparing 
 this volume are threefold: (i) the original jour- 
 nal, of which the first half contained many in- 
 terlinear revisions and expansions, and a con- 
 siderable number of rough pencil sketches of 
 plants, trees, scenery, and notable adventures ; 
 (2) a wide-spaced, typewritten, rough copy of 
 the journal, apparently in large part dictated 
 to a stenographer; it is only slightly revised, 
 and comparison with the original journal shows 
 many significant omissions and additions; (3) 
 
 [ XXV ] 
 
Introduction 
 
 two separate elaborations of his experiences in 
 Savannah when he camped there for a week 
 in the Bonaventure graveyard. Throughout 
 my work upon the primary and secondary 
 materials I was impressed with the scrupu- 
 lous fidelity with which he adhered to the 
 facts and impressions set down in the original 
 journal. 
 
 Readers of Muir's writings need scarcely be 
 told that this book, autobiographically, bridges 
 the period between The Story of my Boyhood 
 and Youth and My First Summer in the Sierra. 
 However, one span of the bridge was lacking, 
 for the journal ends with Mr. Muir's arrival 
 in San Francisco about the first of April, 1868, 
 while his first summer in the Sierra was that of 
 1869. By excerpting from a letter a summary 
 account of his first visit to Yosemite, and in- 
 cluding a description of Twenty Hill Hollow, 
 where he spent a large part of his first year in 
 California, the connection is made complete. 
 The last chapter was first published as an ar- 
 ticle in the Overland Monthly of July, 1872. 
 [ xxvi J 
 
Introduction 
 
 A revised copy of the printed article, found 
 among Muir's literary effects, has been made 
 the basis of the chapter on Twenty Hill Hol- 
 low as it appears in this volume. 
 
 William Frederic Bade 
 
ROUTE OF 
 JOHN MUIR'S THOUSAND- MIL! >j 
 WALK TO THE GULF. 
 
 NOTE: 
 
 BY RAIL. FROM INDIANAPOLIS TO JEFFERSON^ 
 BY BOAT FROM SAVANNAH TO FERNANDINA. 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 to the Gulf 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 KENTUCKY FORESTS AND CAVES 
 
 I HAD long been looking from the wild woods 
 and gardens of the Northern States to those 
 of the warm South, and at last, all draw- 
 backs overcome, I set forth [from Indianapo- 
 lis] on the first day of September, 1867, joyful 
 and free, on a thousand-mile walk to the Gulf 
 of Mexico. [The trip to Jeffersonville, on the 
 banks of the Ohio, was made by rail.] Crossing 
 the Ohio at Louisville [September 2], I steered 
 through the big city by compass without speak- 
 ing a word to any one. Beyond the city I found 
 a road running southward, and after passing a 
 scatterment of suburban cabins and cottages I 
 reached the green woods and spread out my 
 pocket map to rough-hew a plan for my journey. 
 My plan was simply to push on in a general 
 [ 1 ] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 southward direction by the wildest, leafiest, 
 and least trodden way I could find, promising 
 the greatest extent of virgin forest. Folding my 
 map, I shouldered my little bag and plant 
 press and strode away among the old Ken- 
 tucky oaks, rejoicing in splendid visions of 
 pines and palms and tropic flowers in glorious 
 array, not, however, without a few cold shad- 
 ows of loneliness, although the great oaks 
 seemed to spread their arms in welcome. 
 
 I have seen oaks of many species in many 
 kinds of exposure and soil, but those of Kentucky 
 excel in grandeur all I had ever before beheld. 
 They are broad and dense and bright green. In 
 the leafy bowers and caves of their long branches 
 dwell magnificent avenues of shade, and every 
 tree seems to be blessed with a double portion 
 of strong exulting life. Walked twenty miles, 
 mostly on river bottom, and found shelter in 
 a rickety tavern. 
 
 September 3. Escaped from the dust and 
 squalor of my garret bedroom to the glorious 
 forest. All the streams that I tasted hereabouts 
 
 [2] 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 are salty and so are the wells. Salt River was 
 nearly dry. Much of my way this forenoon was 
 over naked limestone. After passing the level 
 ground that extended twenty-five or thirty 
 miles from the river I came to a region of roll- 
 ing hills called Kentucky Knobs — hills of de- 
 nudation, covered with trees to the top. Some 
 of them have a few pines. For a few hours I 
 followed the farmers' paths, but soon wan- 
 dered away from roads and encountered many 
 a tribe of twisted vines difficult to pass. 
 
 Emerging about noon from a grove of giant 
 sunflowers, I found myself on the brink of a 
 tumbling rocky stream [Rolling Fork]. I did 
 not expect to find bridges on my wild ways, 
 and at once started to ford, when a negro 
 woman on the opposite bank earnestly called 
 on me to wait until she could tell the "men 
 folks" to bring me a horse — that the river 
 was too deep and rapid to wade and that I 
 would "sartain be drowned" if I attempted to 
 cross. I replied that my bag and plants would 
 ballast me ; that the water did not appear to be 
 [3] 
 
A 'Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 deep, and that if I were carried away, I was a 
 good swimmer and would soon dry in the sun- 
 shine. But the cautious old soul replied that no 
 one ever waded that river and set off for a horse, 
 saying that it was no trouble at all. 
 
 In a few minutes the ferry horse came gin- 
 gerly down the bank through vines and weeds. 
 His long stilt legs proved him a natural wader. 
 He was white and the little sable negro boy that 
 rode him looked like a bug on his back. After 
 many a tottering halt the outward voyage was 
 safely made, and I mounted behind little Nig. 
 He was a queer specimen, puffy and jet as an 
 India rubber doll and his hair was matted in sec- 
 tions like the wool of a merino sheep. The old 
 horse, overladen with his black and white bur- 
 den, rocked and stumbled on his stilt legs with 
 fair promises of a fall. But all ducking signs 
 failed and we arrived in safety among the weeds 
 and vines of the rugged bank. A salt bath 
 would have done us no harm. I could swim and 
 little Afric looked as if he might float like a 
 bladder. 
 
 [4] 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 I called at the homestead where my ferry- 
 man informed me I would find "tollable " water. 
 But, like all the water of this section that I 
 have tasted, it was intolerable with salt. Every- 
 thing about this old Kentucky home bespoke 
 plenty, unpolished and unmeasured. The house 
 was built in true Southern style, airy, large, 
 and with a transverse central hall that looks 
 like a railway tunnel, and heavy rough out- 
 side chimneys. The negro quarters and other 
 buildings are enough in number for a village, 
 altogether an interesting representative of a 
 genuine old Kentucky home, embosomed in 
 orchards, corn fields and green wooded hills. 
 
 Passed gangs of woodmen engaged in fell- 
 ing and hewing the grand oaks for market. 
 Fruit very abundant. Magnificent flowing hill 
 scenery all afternoon. Walked southeast from 
 Elizabethtown till wearied and lay down in the 
 bushes by guess. 
 
 September 4. The sun was gilding the hill- 
 tops when I was awakened by the alarm notes 
 of birds whose dwelling in a hazel thicket I had 
 [5] 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 disturbed. They flitted excitedly close to my 
 head, as if scolding or asking angry questions, 
 while several beautiful plants, strangers to me, 
 were looking me full in the face. The first bo- 
 tanical discovery in bed ! This was one of the 
 most delightful camp grounds, though groped 
 for in the dark, and I lingered about it enjoying 
 its trees and soft lights and music. 
 
 Walked ten miles of forest. Met a strange 
 oak with willow-looking leaves. Entered a 
 sandy stretch of black oak called "Barrens, ,, 
 many of which were sixty or seventy feet in 
 height, and are said to have grown since the 
 fires were kept off, forty years ago. The farm- 
 ers hereabouts are tall, stout, happy fellows, 
 fond of guns and horses. Enjoyed friendly 
 chats with them. Arrived at dark in a village 
 that seemed to be drawing its last breath. Was 
 guided to the "tavern" by a negro who was ex- 
 tremely accommodating. " No trouble at all," 
 he said. 
 
 September 5. No bird or flower or friendly 
 tree above me this morning; only squalid garret 
 [6] 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 rubbish and dust. Escaped to the woods. Came 
 to the region of caves. At the mouth of the first 
 I discovered, I was surprised to find ferns which 
 belonged to the coolest nooks of Wisconsin and 
 northward, but soon observed that each cave 
 rim has a zone of climate peculiar to itself, and 
 it is always cool. This cave had an opening 
 about ten feet in diameter, and twenty-five 
 feet perpendicular depth. A strong cold wind 
 issued from it and I could hear the sounds of 
 running water. A long pole was set against its 
 walls as if intended for a ladder, but in some 
 places it was slippery and smooth as a mast and 
 would test the climbing powers of a monkey. 
 The walls and rim of this natural reservoir were 
 finely carved and flowered. Bushes leaned over 
 it with shading leaves, and beautiful ferns and 
 mosses were in rows and sheets on its slopes 
 and shelves. Lingered here a long happy while, 
 pressing specimens and printing this beauty 
 into memory. 
 
 Arrived about noon at Munfordville ; was 
 soon discovered and examined by Mr. Mun- 
 [7l 
 
A Thousand-Mile JValk 
 
 ford himself, a pioneer and father of the village. 
 He is a surveyor — has held all country offices, 
 and every seeker of roads and lands applies to 
 him for information. He regards all the vil- 
 lagers as his children, and all strangers who en- 
 ter Munfordville as his own visitors. Of course 
 he inquired my business, destination, et cetera, 
 and invited me to his house. 
 
 After refreshing me with "parrs" he compla- 
 cently covered the table with bits of rocks, 
 plants, et cetera, things new and old which he 
 had gathered in his surveying walks and sup- 
 posed to be full of scientific interest. He in- 
 formed me that all scientific men applied to him 
 for information, and as I was a botanist, he 
 either possessed, or ought to possess, the knowl- 
 edge I was seeking, and so I received long 
 lessons concerning roots and herbs for every 
 mortal ill. Thanking my benefactor for his 
 kindness, I escaped to the fields and followed a 
 railroad along the base of a grand hill ridge. As 
 evening came on all the dwellings I found seemed 
 to repel me, and I could not muster courage 
 [8 ] 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 enough to ask entertainment at any of them. 
 Took refuge in a log schoolhouse that stood on 
 a hillside beneath stately oaks and slept on the 
 softest looking of the benches. 
 
 September 6. Started at the earliest bird song 
 in hopes of seeing the great Mammoth Cave 
 before evening. Overtook an old negro driving 
 an ox team. Rode with him a few miles and 
 had some interesting chat concerning war, wild 
 fruits of the woods, et cetera. "Right heah, ,, 
 said he, "is where the Rebs was a-tearin' up the 
 track, and they all a sudden thought they seed 
 the Yankees a-comin', obah dem big hills dar, 
 and Lo'd, how dey run." I asked him if he 
 would like a renewal of these sad war times, 
 when his flexible face suddenly calmed, and he 
 said with intense earnestness, "Oh, Lo'd, want 
 no mo wa, Lo'd no." Many of these Kentucky 
 negroes are shrewd and intelligent, and when 
 warmed upon a subject that interests them, are 
 eloquent in no mean degree. 
 
 Arrived at Horse Cave, about ten miles from 
 the great cave. The entrance is by a long easy 
 [9] 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 slope of several hundred yards. It seems like 
 a noble gateway to the birthplace of springs 
 and fountains and the dark treasuries of the 
 mineral kingdom. This cave is in a village 
 [of the same name] which it supplies with an 
 abundance of cold water, and cold air that 
 issues from its fern-clad lips. In hot weather 
 crowds of people sit about it in the shade of 
 the trees that guard it. This magnificent fan 
 is capable of cooling everybody in the town at 
 once. 
 
 Those who live near lofty mountains may 
 climb to cool weather in a day or two, but the 
 overheated Kentuckians can find a patch of cool 
 climate in almost every glen in the State. The 
 villager who accompanied me said that Horse 
 Cave had never been fully explored, but that it 
 was several miles in length at least. He told me 
 that he had never been at Mammoth Cave — 
 that it was not worth going ten miles to see, as 
 it was nothing but a hole in the ground, and I 
 found that his was no rare case. He was one 
 of the useful, practical men — too wise to waste 
 [ io 1 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 precious time with weeds, caves, fossils, or any- 
 thing else that he could not eat. 
 1 Arrived at the great Mammoth Cave. I was 
 surprised to find it in so complete naturalness. 
 A large hotel with fine walks and gardens is 
 near it. But fortunately the cave has been un- 
 improved, and were it not for the narrow trail 
 that leads down the glen to its door, one would 
 not know that it had been visited. There are 
 house-rooms and halls whose entrances give 
 but slight hint of their grandeur. And so also 
 this magnificent hall in the mineral kingdom of 
 Kentucky has a door comparatively small and 
 unpromising. One might pass within a few 
 yards of it without noticing it. A strong cool 
 breeze issues constantly from it, creating a 
 northern climate for the ferns that adorn its 
 rocky front. 
 
 I never before saw Nature's grandeur in so 
 abrupt contrast with paltry artificial gardens. 
 The fashionable hotel grounds are in exact 
 parlor taste, with many a beautiful plant cul- 
 tivated to deformity, and arranged in strict 
 [ii] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 geometrical beds, the whole pretty affair a 
 laborious failure side by side with Divine 
 beauty. The trees around the mouth of the 
 cave are smooth and tall and bent forward 
 at the bottom, then straight upwards. Only 
 a butternut seems, by its angular knotty 
 branches, to sympathize with and belong to 
 the cave, with a fine growth of Cystopteris 
 and Hypnum. 
 
 Started for Glasgow Junction. Got belated 
 in the hill woods. Inquired my way at a farm- 
 house and was invited to stay overnight in a 
 rare, hearty, hospitable manner. Engaged in 
 familiar running talk on politics, war times, and 
 theology. The old Kentuckian seemed to take 
 a liking to me and advised me to stay in these 
 hills until next spring, assuring me that I would 
 find much to interest me in and about the Great 
 Cave; also, that he was one of the school offi- 
 cials and was sure that I could obtain their 
 school for the winter term. I sincerely thanked 
 him for his kind plans, but pursued my own. 
 
 September 7. Left the hospitable Kentuck- 
 [ 12 1 
 
ENTRANCE TO MAMMOTH CAVE 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 ians with their sincere good wishes and bore 
 away southward again through the deep green 
 woods. In noble forests all day. Saw mistletoe 
 for the first time. Part of the day I traveled 
 with a Kentuckian from near Burkesville. He 
 spoke to all the negroes he met with familiar 
 kindly greetings, addressing them always as 
 "Uncles" and "Aunts." All travelers one meets 
 on these roads, white and black, male and 
 female, travel on horseback. Glasgow is one 
 of the few Southern towns that shows ordinary 
 American life. At night with a well-to-do 
 farmer. 
 
 September 8. Deep, green, bossy sea of wav- 
 ing, flowing hilltops. Corn and cotton and to- 
 bacco fields scattered here and there. I had 
 imagined that a cotton field in flower was 
 something magnificent. But cotton is a coarse, 
 rough, straggling, unhappy looking plant, not 
 half as good-looking as a field of Irish potatoes. 
 
 Met a great many negroes going to meeting, 
 dressed in their Sunday best. Fat, happy look- 
 ing, and contented. The scenery on approaching 
 [ 13 1 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 the Cumberland River becomes still grander. 
 Burkesville, in beautiful location, is embosomed 
 in a glorious array of verdant flowing hills. The 
 Cumberland must be a happy stream. I think 
 I could enjoy traveling with it in the midst of 
 such beauty all my life. This evening I could 
 find none willing to take me in, and so lay down 
 on a hillside and fell asleep muttering praises 
 to the happy abounding beauty of Kentucky. 
 
 September g. Another day in the most fa- 
 vored province of bird and flower. Many rapid 
 streams, flowing in beautiful flower-bordered 
 canons embosomed in dense woods. Am seated 
 on a grand hill-slope that leans back against 
 the sky like a picture. Amid the wide waves 
 of green wood there are spots of autumnal 
 yellow and the atmosphere, too, has the dawn- 
 ings of autumn in colors and sounds. The soft 
 light of morning falls upon ripening forests of 
 oak and elm, walnut and hickory, and all Na- 
 ture is thoughtful and calm. Kentucky is the 
 greenest, leafiest State I have yet seen. The 
 sea of soft temperate plant-green is deepest here. 
 [ 14 1 
 
Kentucky Forests and Caves 
 
 Comparing volumes of vegetable verdure in 
 different countries to a wedge, the thick end 
 would be in the forests of Kentucky, the other 
 in the lichens and mosses of the North. This 
 verdure wedge would not be perfect in its lines. 
 From Kentucky it would maintain its thickness 
 long and well in passing the level forests of 
 Indiana and Canada. From the maples and 
 pines of Canada it would slope rapidly to the 
 bleak Arctic hills with dwarf birches and alders ; 
 thence it would thin out in a long edge among 
 hardy lichens and liverworts and mosses to 
 the dwelling-places of everlasting frost. Far the 
 grandest of all Kentucky plants are her noble 
 oaks. They are the master existences of her 
 exuberant forests. Here is the Eden, the para- 
 dise of oaks. Passed the Kentucky line towards 
 evening and obtained food and shelter from a 
 thrifty Tennessee farmer, after he had made 
 use of all the ordinary anti-hospitable argu- 
 ments of cautious comfortable families. 
 
 September 10. Escaped from a heap of un- 
 cordial kindness to the generous bosom of the 
 I 15] 
 
A Thousand-Mile VTalk 
 
 woods. After a few miles of level ground in 
 luxuriant tangles of brooding vines, I began the 
 ascent of the Cumberland Mountains, the first 
 real mountains that my foot ever touched or 
 eyes beheld. The ascent was by a nearly regu- 
 lar zigzag slope, mostly covered up like a tun- 
 nel by overarching oaks. But there were a few 
 openings where the glorious forest road of Ken- 
 tucky was grandly seen, stretching over hill 
 and valley, adjusted to every slope and curve 
 by the hands of Nature — the most sublime 
 and comprehensive picture that ever entered 
 my eyes. Reached the summit in six or seven 
 hours — a strangely long period of up-grade 
 work to one accustomed only to the hillocky 
 levels of Wisconsin and adjacent States. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 CROSSING THE CUMBERLAND MOUNTAINS 
 
 I HAD climbed but a short distance when 
 I was overtaken by a young man on horse- 
 back, who soon showed that he intended to 
 rob me if he should find the job worth while. 
 After he had inquired where I came from, and 
 where I was going, he offered to carry my bag. 
 I told him that it was so light that I did not 
 feel it at all a burden ; but he insisted and coaxed 
 until I allowed him to carry it. As soon as he 
 had gained possession I noticed that he gradu- 
 ally increased his speed, evidently trying to get 
 far enough ahead of me to examine the con- 
 tents without being observed. But I was too 
 good a walker and runner for him to get far. 
 At a turn of the road, after trotting his horse 
 for about half an hour, and when he thought he 
 was out of sight, I caught him rummaging my 
 poor bag. Finding there only a comb, brush, 
 towel, soap, a change of underclothing, a copy 
 [ i7 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 of Burns's poems, Milton's Paradise Lost, and 
 a small New Testament, he waited for me, 
 handed back my bag, and returned down the 
 hill, saying that he had forgotten something. 
 
 I found splendid growths of shining-leaved 
 Ericacece [heathworts] for which the Alleghany 
 Mountains are noted. Also ferns of which Os- 
 munda cinnamomea [Cinnamon Fern] is the 
 largest and perhaps the most abundant. Os- 
 munda regalis [Flowering Fern] is also common 
 here, but not large. In Wood's * and Gray's 
 Botany Osmunda cinnamomea is said to be a 
 much larger fern than Osmunda claytoniana. 
 This I found to be true in Tennessee and 
 southward, but in Indiana, part of Illinois, and 
 Wisconsin the opposite is true. Found here 
 the beautiful, sensitive Schrankia, or sensitive 
 brier. It is a long, prickly, leguminous vine, 
 with dense heads of small, yellow fragrant 
 flowers. 
 
 1 Alphonso Wood, Class-book of Botany, with a Flora of 
 the United States and Canada. The copy of this work, carried 
 by Mr. Muir on his wanderings, is still extant. The edition 
 is that of 1862. 
 
 [ 18] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 Vines growing on roadsides receive many a 
 tormenting blow, simply because they give evi- 
 dence of feeling. Sensitive people are served 
 in the same way. But the roadside vine soon 
 becomes less sensitive, like people getting used 
 to teasing — Nature, in this instance, making for 
 the comfort of flower creatures the same benev- 
 olent arrangement as for man. Thus I found 
 that the Schrankia vines growing along foot- 
 paths leading to a backwoods schoolhouse were 
 much less sensitive than those in the adjacent 
 unfrequented woods, having learned to pay but 
 slight attention to the tingling strokes they 
 get from teasing scholars. 
 
 It is startling to see the pairs of pinnate 
 leaves rising quickly out of the grass and fold- 
 ing themselves close in regular succession from 
 the root to the end of the prostrate stems, ten 
 to twenty feet in length. How little we know as 
 yet of the life of plants — their hopes and fears, 
 pains and enjoyments! 
 
 Traveled a few miles with an old Tennessee 
 farmer who was much excited on account of the 
 [19] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 news he had just heard. "Three kingdoms, 
 England, Ireland, and Russia, have declared 
 war agin the United States. Oh, it's terrible, 
 terrible," said he. "This big war comin , so 
 quick, after our own big fight. Well, it can't be 
 helped, and all I have to say is, Amerricay for- 
 ever, but I 'd a heap rather they did n't fight." 
 
 "But are you sure the news is true?" I in- 
 quired. "Oh, yes, quite sure," he replied, "for 
 me and some of my neighbors were down at the 
 store last night, and Jim Smith can read, and 
 he found out all about it in a newspaper." 
 
 Passed the poor, rickety, thrice-dead village 
 of Jamestown, an incredibly dreary place. 
 Toward the top of the Cumberland grade, about 
 two hours before sundown I came to a log house, 
 and as I had been warned that all the broad 
 plateau of the range for forty or fifty miles was 
 desolate, I began thus early to seek a lodging 
 for the night. Knocking at the door, a motherly 
 old lady replied to my request for supper and 
 bed and breakfast, that I was welcome to the 
 best she had, provided that I had the necessary 
 
 [20] 
 

"The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 change to pay my bill. When I told her that un- 
 fortunately I had nothing smaller than a five- 
 dollar greenback, she said, "Well, I'm sorry, 
 but cannot afford to keep you. Not long ago 
 ten soldiers came across from North Carolina, 
 and in the morning they offered a greenback 
 that I could n't change, and so I got nothing for 
 keeping them, which I was ill able to afford." 
 "Very well," I said, "I'm glad you spoke of 
 this beforehand, for I would rather go hungry 
 than impose on your hospitality." 
 
 As I turned to leave, after bidding her good- 
 bye, she, evidently pitying me for my tired 
 looks, called me back and asked me if I would 
 like a drink of milk. This I gladly accepted, 
 thinking that perhaps I might not be success- 
 ful in getting any other nourishment for a day 
 or two. Then I inquired whether there were any 
 more houses on the road, nearer than North 
 Carolina, forty or fifty miles away. "Yes," 
 she said, "it's only two miles to the next 
 house, but beyond that there are no houses 
 that I know of except empty ones whose own- 
 [21 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 ers have been killed or driven away during the 
 war." 
 
 Arriving at the last house, my knock at the 
 door was answered by a bright, good-natured, 
 good-looking little woman, who in reply to my 
 request for a night's lodging and food, said, " Oh, 
 I guess so. I think you can stay. Come in and 
 I'll call my husband." "But I must first warn 
 you," I said, "that I have nothing smaller to 
 offer you than a five-dollar bill for my enter- 
 tainment. I don't want you to think that I am 
 trying to impose on your hospitality." 
 
 She then called her husband, a blacksmith, 
 who was at work at his forge. He came out, 
 hammer in hand, bare-breasted, sweaty, be- 
 grimed, and covered with shaggy black hair. 
 In reply to his wife's statement, that this young 
 man wished to stop over night, he quickly re- 
 plied, "That's all right; tell him to go into the 
 house." He was turning to go back to his shop, 
 when his wife added, " But he says he has n't 
 any change to pay. He has nothing smaller 
 than a five-dollar bill." Hesitating only a mo- 
 
 [22] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 ment, he turned on his heel and said, "Tell him 
 to go into the house. A man that comes right 
 out like that beforehand is welcome to eat my 
 bread." 
 
 When he came in after his hard day's work 
 and sat down to dinner, he solemnly asked a 
 blessing on the frugal meal, consisting solely of 
 corn bread and bacon. Then, looking across the 
 table at me, he said, "Young man, what are 
 you doing down here?" I replied that I was 
 looking at plants. "Plants? What kind of 
 plants?" I said, "Oh, all kinds; grass, weeds, 
 flowers, trees, mosses, ferns, — almost every- 
 thing that grows is interesting to me." 
 
 "Well, young man," he queried, "you mean 
 to say that you are not employed by the Gov- 
 ernment on some private business?" "No," I 
 said, "I am not employed by any one except 
 just myself. I love all kinds of plants, and I 
 came down here to these Southern States to get 
 acquainted with as many of them as possible." 
 
 "You look like a strong-minded man," he re- 
 plied, "and surely you are able to do something 
 [23 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 better than wander over the country and look 
 at weeds and blossoms. These are hard times, 
 and real work is required of every man that is 
 able. Picking up blossoms does n't seem to be 
 a man's work at all in any kind of times." 
 
 To this I replied, "You are a believer in the 
 Bible, are you not?" "Oh, yes." "Well, you 
 know Solomon was a strong-minded man, and 
 he is generally believed to have been the very 
 wisest man the world ever saw, and yet he con- 
 sidered it was worth while to study plants; 
 not only to go and pick them up as I am doing, 
 but to study them ; and you know we are told 
 that he wrote a book about plants, not only of 
 the great cedars of Lebanon, but of little bits of 
 things growing in the cracks of the walls." 1 
 
 "Therefore, you see that Solomon differed 
 very much more from you than from me in this 
 matter. I '11 warrant you he had many a long 
 ramble in the mountains of Judea, and had he 
 
 1 The previously mentioned copy of Wood's Botany, used 
 by John Muir, quotes on the title page I Kings iv, 33: "He 
 spake of trees, from the cedar of Lebanon even unto the 
 hyssop that springeth out of the wall." 
 
 [24] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 been a Yankee he would likely have visited every 
 weed in the land. And again, do you not remem- 
 ber that Christ told his disciples to 'consider 
 the lilies how they grow/ and compared their 
 beauty with Solomon in all his glory? Now, 
 whose advice am I to take, yours or Christ's? 
 Christ says, 'Consider the lilies/ You say, 
 'Don't consider them. It is n't worth while for 
 any strong-minded man/ " 
 
 This evidently satisfied him, and he acknowl- 
 edged that he had never thought of blossoms 
 in that way before. He repeated again and 
 again that I must be a very strong-minded man, 
 and admitted that no doubt I was fully justified 
 in picking up blossoms. He then told me that 
 although the war was over, walking across the 
 Cumberland Mountains still was far from safe 
 on account of small bands of guerrillas who were 
 in hiding along the roads, and earnestly entreated 
 me to turn back and not to think of walking so 
 far as the Gulf of Mexico until the country be- 
 came quiet and orderly once more. 
 
 I replied that I had no fear, that I had but 
 
 [2 5 ] 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile IValk 
 
 very little to lose, and that nobody was likely to 
 think it worth while to rob me ; that, anyhow, 
 I always had good luck. In the morning he 
 repeated the warning and entreated me to turn 
 back, which never for a moment interfered with 
 my resolution to pursue my glorious walk. 
 
 September II. Long stretch of level sand- 
 stone plateau, lightly furrowed and dimpled 
 with shallow groove-like valleys and hills. The 
 trees are mostly oaks, planted wide apart like 
 those in the Wisconsin woods. A good many 
 pine trees here and there, forty to eighty feet 
 high, and most of the ground is covered with 
 showy flowers. Polygalas [milkworts], solida- 
 goes [goldenrods], and asters were especially 
 abundant. I came to a cool clear brook every 
 half mile or so, the^banks planted with Os- 
 munda regalis, Osmunda cinnamomea, and hand- 
 some sedges. The few larger streams were 
 fringed with laurels and azaleas. Large areas 
 beneath the trees are covered with formidable 
 green briers and brambles, armed with hooked 
 claws, and almost impenetrable. Houses are 
 [26] 
 
"The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 far apart and uninhabited, orchards and fences 
 in ruins — sad marks of war. 
 
 About noon my road became dim and at 
 last vanished among desolate fields. Lost and 
 hungry, I knew my direction but could not keep 
 it on account of the briers. My path was indeed 
 strewn with flowers, but as thorny, also, as mor- 
 tal ever trod. In trying to force a way through 
 these cat-plants one is not simply clawed and 
 pricked through all one's clothing, but caught 
 and held fast. The toothed arching branches 
 come down over and above you like cruel liv- 
 ing arms, and the more you struggle the more 
 desperately you are entangled, and your 
 wounds deepened and multiplied. The South 
 has plant fly-catchers. It also has plant man- 
 catchers. 
 
 After a great deal of defensive fighting and 
 struggling I escaped to a road and a house, but 
 failed to find food or shelter. Towards sun- 
 down, as I was walking rapidly along a straight 
 stretch in the road, I suddenly came in sight of 
 ten mounted men riding abreast. They un- 
 [27] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 doubtedly had seen me before I discovered 
 them, for they had stopped their horses and 
 were evidently watching me. I saw at once that 
 it was useless to attempt to avoid them, for 
 the ground thereabout was quite open. I knew 
 that there was nothing for it but to face them 
 fearlessly, without showing the slightest sus- 
 picion of foul play. Therefore, without halting 
 even for a moment, I advanced rapidly with 
 long strides as though I intended to walk through 
 the midst of them. When I got within a rod or 
 so I looked up in their faces and smilingly bade 
 them "Howdy." Stopping never an instant, I 
 turned to one side and walked around them to 
 get on the road again, and kept on without ven- 
 turing to look back or to betray the slightest 
 fear of being robbed. 
 
 After I had gone about one hundred or one 
 hundred and fifty yards, I ventured a quick 
 glance back, without stopping, and saw in this 
 flash of an eye that all the ten had turned their 
 horses toward me and were evidently talking 
 about me; supposedly, with reference to what 
 [28] 
 
"The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 my object was, where I was going, and whether 
 it would be worth while to rob me. They all 
 were mounted on rather scrawny horses, and all 
 wore long hair hanging down on their shoulders. 
 Evidently they belonged to the most irreclaim- 
 able of the guerrilla bands who, long accus- 
 tomed to plunder, deplored the coming of peace. 
 I was not followed, however, probably because 
 the plants projecting from my plant press made 
 them believe that I was a poor herb doctor, a 
 common occupation Jn these mountain regions. 
 About dark I discovered, a little off the road, 
 another house, inhabited by negroes, where I 
 succeeded in obtaining a much needed meal 
 of string beans, buttermilk, and corn bread. At 
 the table I was seated in a bottomless chair, 
 and as I became sore and heavy, I sank deeper 
 and deeper, pressing my knees against my 
 breast, and my mouth settled to the level of my 
 plate. But wild hunger cares for none of these 
 things, and my curiously compressed position 
 prevented the too free indulgence of boisterous 
 appetite. Of course, I was compelled to sleep 
 [29] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 with the trees in the one great bedroom of the 
 open night. 
 
 September 12. Awoke drenched with moun- 
 tain mist, which made a grand show, as it 
 moved away before the hot sun. Passed Mont- 
 gomery, a shabby village at the head of the 
 east slope of the Cumberland Mountains. Ob- 
 tained breakfast in a clean house and began the 
 descent of the mountains. Obtained fine views 
 of a wide, open country, and distant flanking 
 ridges and spurs. Crossed a wide cool stream 
 [Emory River], a branch of the Clinch River. 
 There is nothing more eloquent in Nature than 
 a mountain stream, and this is the first I ever 
 saw. Its banks are luxuriantly peopled with 
 rare and lovely flowers and overarching trees, 
 making one of Nature's coolest and most hos- 
 pitable places. Every tree, every flower, every 
 ripple and eddy of this lovely stream seemed 
 solemnly to feel the presence of the great Cre- 
 ator. Lingered in this sanctuary a long time 
 thanking the Lord with all my heart for his 
 goodness in allowing me to enter and enjoy it. 
 [30] 
 
77?e Cumberland Mountains 
 
 Discovered two ferns, Dicksonia and a small 
 matted polypod on trees, common farther 
 South. Also a species of magnolia with very- 
 large leaves and scarlet conical fruit. Near this 
 stream I spent some joyous time in a grand 
 rock-dwelling full of mosses, birds, and flowers. 
 Most heavenly place I ever entered. The long 
 narrow valleys of the mountainside, all well 
 watered and nobly adorned with oaks, magno- 
 lias, laurels, azaleas, asters, ferns, Hypnum 
 mosses, Madotheca [Scale-mosses], etc. Also 
 towering clumps of beautiful hemlocks. The 
 hemlock, judging from the common species of 
 Canada, I regarded as the least noble of the 
 conifers. But those of the eastern valleys of the 
 Cumberland Mountains are as perfect in form 
 and regal in port as the pines themselves. The 
 latter abundant. Obtained fine glimpses from 
 open places as I descended to the great valley 
 between these mountains and the Unaka Moun- 
 tains on the state line. Forded the Clinch, a 
 beautiful clear stream, that knows many of the 
 dearest mountain retreats that ever heard the 
 [31 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 music of running water. Reached Kingston 
 before dark. Sent back my plant collections by 
 express to my brother in Wisconsin. 
 
 September jj. Walked all day across small 
 parallel valleys that flute the surface of the one 
 wide valley. These flutings appear to have 
 been formed by lateral pressure, are fertile, and 
 contain some fine forms, though the seal of war 
 is on all things. The roads never seem to pro- 
 ceed with any fixed purpose, but wander as if 
 lost. In seeking the way to Philadelphia [in 
 Loudon County, Tennessee], I was told by a 
 buxom Tennessee "gal" that over the hills was 
 much the nearer way, that she always went that 
 way, and that surely I could travel it. 
 
 I started over the flint-ridges, but soon 
 reached a set of enchanted little valleys among 
 which, no matter how or in what direction I 
 traveled, I could not get a foot nearer to Phila- 
 delphia. At last, consulting my map and com- 
 pass, I neglected all directions and finally 
 reached the house of a negro driver, with whom 
 I put up for the night. Received a good deal of 
 [32] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 knowledge which may be of use should I ever 
 be a negro teamster. 
 
 September 14. Philadelphia is a very filthy 
 village in a beautiful situation. More or less of 
 pine. Black oak most abundant. Poly podium 
 hexagonopterum and Aspidium acrostichoides 
 [Christmas Fern] most abundant of ferns and 
 most generally distributed. Osmunda claytoni- 
 ana rare, not in fruit, small. Dicksonia abun- 
 dant, after leaving the Cumberland Mountains. 
 Asplenium ebeneum [Ebony Spleenwort] quite 
 common in Tennessee and many parts of Ken- 
 tucky. Cystopteris [Bladder Fern], and Asplen- 
 ium filix-fcemina not common through the same 
 range. Pteris aquilina [Common Brake] abun- 
 dant, but small. 
 
 Walked through many a leafy valley, shady 
 grove, and cool brooklet. Reached Madison- 
 ville, a brisk village. Came in full view of the 
 Unaka Mountains, a magnificent sight. Stayed 
 over night with a pleasant young farmer. 
 
 September 1$. Most glorious billowy moun- 
 tain scenery. Made many a halt at open places 
 .133 ] 
 
A 'Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 to take breath and to admire. The road, in 
 many places cut into the rock, goes winding 
 about among the knobs and gorges. Dense 
 growth of asters, liatris, 1 and grapevines. 
 
 Reached a house before night, and asked 
 leave to stop. "Well, you're welcome to stop," 
 said the mountaineer, "if you think you can 
 live till morning on what I have to live on all 
 the time." Found the old gentleman very com- 
 municative. Was favored with long "bar" 
 stories, deer hunts, etc., and in the morning 
 was pressed to stay a day or two. 
 
 September 16. "I will take you," said he, 
 "to the highest ridge in the country, where 
 you can see both ways. You will have a view 
 of all the world on one side of the mountains 
 and all creation on the other. Besides, you, 
 who are traveling for curiosity and wonder, 
 
 1 Wood's Botany, edition of 1862, furnishes the following 
 interesting comment on Liatris odoratissima (Willd.), popu- 
 larly known as Vanilla Plant or Deer's Tongue: "The fleshy 
 leaves exhale a rich fragrance even for years after they are 
 dry, and are therefore by the southern planters largely mixed 
 with their cured tobacco, to impart its fragrance to that 
 nauseous weed." 
 
 [34] 
 

 The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 ought to see our gold mines. I agreed to stay 
 and went to the mines. Gold is found in small 
 quantities throughout the Alleghanies, and 
 many farmers work at mining a few weeks or 
 months every year when their time is not more 
 valuable for other pursuits. In this neighbor- 
 hood miners are earning from half a dollar to 
 two dollars a day. There are several large 
 quartz mills not far from here. Common labor 
 is worth ten dollars a month. 
 
 September 17. Spent the day in botanizing, 
 blacksmithing, and examining a grist mill. 
 Grist mills, in the less settled parts of Tennes- 
 see and North Carolina, are remarkably simple 
 affairs. A small stone, that a man might carry 
 under his arm, is fastened to the vertical shaft 
 of a little home-made, boyish-looking, back- 
 action water-wheel, which, with a hopper and 
 a box to receive the meal, is the whole affair. 
 The walls of the mill are of undressed poles cut 
 from seedling trees and there is no floor, as 
 lumber is dear. No dam is built. The water is 
 conveyed along some hillside until sufficient 
 [3Sl 
 
A Thousand-Mile Tf^alk 
 
 fall is obtained, a thing easily done in the 
 mountains. 
 
 On Sundays you may see wild, unshorn, un- 
 combed men coming out of the woods, each 
 with a bag of corn on his back. From a peck to 
 a bushel is a common grist. They go to the mill 
 along verdant footpaths, winding up and down 
 over hill and valley, and crossing many a rho- 
 dodendron glen. The flowers and shining leaves 
 brush against their shoulders and knees, occa- 
 sionally knocking off their coon-skin caps. The 
 first arrived throws his corn into the hopper, 
 turns on the water, and goes to the house. 
 After chatting and smoking he returns to see 
 if his grist is done. Should the stones run 
 empty for an hour or two, it does no harm. 
 
 This is a fair average in equipment and ca- 
 pacity of a score of mills that I saw in Tennes- 
 see. This one was built by John Vohn, who 
 claimed that he could make it grind twenty 
 bushels a day. But since it fell into other hands 
 it can be made to grind only ten per day. All 
 the machines of Kentucky and Tennessee are 
 [ 36 ] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 far behind the age. There is scarce a trace of 
 that restless spirit of speculation and inven- 
 tion so characteristic of the North. But one 
 way of doing things obtains here, as if laws had 
 been passed making attempts at improvement 
 a crime. Spinning and weaving are done in 
 every one of these mountain cabins wher- 
 ever the least pretensions are made to thrift 
 and economy. The practice of these ancient 
 arts they deem marks of advancement rather 
 than of backwardness. "There's a place back 
 heah," said my worthy entertainer, "whar 
 there's a mill-house, an' a store-house, an' a 
 still-house, an' a spring-house, an' a blacksmith 
 shop — all in the same yard! Cows too, an' 
 heaps of big gals a-milkin' them." 
 
 This is the most primitive country I have 
 seen, primitive in everything. The remotest 
 hidden parts of Wisconsin are far in advance of 
 the mountain regions of Tennessee and North 
 Carolina. But my host speaks of the "old- 
 fashioned unenlightened times," like a phi- 
 losopher in the best light of civilization. "I 
 [37 1 
 
A thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 believe in Providence," said he. "Our fathers 
 came into these valleys, got the richest of them, 
 and skimmed off the cream of the soil. The 
 worn-out ground won't yield no roastin' ears 
 now. But the Lord foresaw this state of af- 
 fairs, and prepared something else for us. And 
 what is it? Why He meant us to bust open 
 these copper mines and gold mines, so that 
 we may have money to buy the corn that we 
 cannot raise." A most profound observation. 
 September 18. Up the mountain on the state 
 line. The scenery is far grander than any I 
 ever before beheld. The view extends from the 
 Cumberland Mountains on the north far into 
 Georgia and North Carolina to the south, an 
 area of about five thousand square miles. Such 
 an ocean of wooded, waving, swelling moun- 
 tain beauty and grandeur is not to be described. 
 Countless forest-clad hills, side by side in rows 
 and groups, seemed to be enjoying the rich 
 sunshine and remaining motionless only be- 
 cause they were so eagerly absorbing it. All 
 were united by curves and slopes of inimitable 
 [38] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 softness and beauty. Oh, these forest gardens 
 of our Father! What perfection, what divin- 
 ity, in their architecture! What simplicity and 
 mysterious complexity of detail! Who shall 
 read the teaching of these sylvan pages, the 
 glad brotherhood of rills that sing in the val- 
 leys, and all the happy creatures that dwell in 
 them under the tender keeping of a Father's 
 care? 
 
 September ig. Received another solemn warn- 
 ing of dangers on my way through the moun- 
 tains. Was told by my worthy entertainer of a 
 wondrous gap in the mountains which he ad- 
 vised me to see. "It is called Track Gap," said 
 he, "from the great number of tracks in the 
 rocks — bird tracks, bar tracks, hoss tracks, 
 men tracks, all in the solid rock as if it had been 
 mud." Bidding farewell to my worthy moun- 
 taineer and all his comfortable wonders, I pur- 
 sued my way to the South. 
 
 As I was leaving, he repeated the warnings of 
 danger ahead, saying that there were a good 
 many people living like wild beasts on whatever 
 [ 39 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 they could steal, and that murders were some- 
 times committed for four or five dollars, and 
 even less. While stopping with him I noticed 
 that a man came regularly after dark to the 
 house for his supper. He was armed with a gun, 
 a pistol, and a long knife. My host told me that 
 this man was at feud with one of his neighbors, 
 and that they were prepared to shoot one an- 
 other at sight. That neither of them could do 
 any regular work or sleep in the same place two 
 nights in succession. That they visited houses 
 only for food, and as soon as the one that I saw 
 had got his supper he went out and slept in the 
 woods, without of course making a fire. His 
 enemy did the same. 
 
 My entertainer told me that he was trying 
 to make peace between these two men, because 
 they both were good men, and if they would 
 agree to stop their quarrel, they could then 
 both go to work. Most of the food in this house 
 was coffee without sugar, corn bread, and some- 
 times bacon. But the coffee was the greatest 
 luxury which these people knew. The only way 
 [ 40 1 
 
"The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 of obtaining it was by selling skins, or, in par- 
 ticular, "sang," that is ginseng, 1 which found 
 a market in far-off China. 
 
 My path all to-day led me along the leafy 
 banks of the Hiwassee, 2 a most impressive 
 mountain river. Its channel is very rough, as 
 it crosses the edges of upturned rock strata, 
 some of them standing at right angles, or 
 glancing off obliquely to right and left. Thus a 
 multitude of short, resounding cataracts are 
 produced, and the river is restrained from the 
 headlong speed due to its volume and the in- 
 clination of its bed. 
 
 All the larger streams of uncultivated coun- 
 tries are mysteriously charming and beautiful, 
 whether flowing in mountains or through 
 swamps and plains. Their channels are inter- 
 
 1 Muir's journal contains the following additional note: 
 "M. County produces #5000 worth a year of ginseng root, 
 valued at seventy cents a pound. Under the law it is not al- 
 lowed to be gathered until the first of September." 
 
 2 In his journal Muir spells the name "Hiawassee," a 
 form which occurs on many of the older maps. The name 
 probably is derived from the Cherokee Indian " Ayuhwasi," 
 a name applied to several of their former settlements. 
 
 [41 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 estingly sculptured, far more so than the grand- 
 est architectural works of man. The finest of 
 the forests are usually found along their banks, 
 and in the multitude of falls and rapids the wil- 
 derness finds a voice. Such a river is the Hi- 
 wassee, with its surface broken to a thousand 
 sparkling gems, and its forest walls vine- 
 draped and flowery as Eden. And how fine the 
 songs it sings! 
 
 In Murphy [North Carolina] I was "hailed 
 by the sheriff who could not determine by my 
 colors and rigging to what country or craft I 
 belonged. Since the war, every other stranger 
 in these lonely parts is supposed to be a crimi- 
 nal, and all are objects of curiosity or appre- 
 hensive concern. After a few minutes' conver- 
 sation with this chief man of Murphy I was 
 pronounced harmless, and invited to his house, 
 where for the first time since leaving home I 
 found a house decked with flowers and vines, 
 clean within and without, and stamped with 
 the comforts of culture and refinement in all 
 its arrangements. Striking contrast to the un- 
 [42I 
 
"The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 couth transitionist establishments from the 
 wigwams of savages to the clumsy but clean 
 log castle of the thrifty pioneer. 
 
 September 20. All day among the groves and 
 gorges of Murphy with Mr. Beale. Was shown 
 the site of Camp Butler where General Scott 
 had his headquarters when he removed the 
 Cherokee Indians to a new home in the West. 
 Found a number of rare and strange plants on 
 the rocky banks of the river Hiwassee. In the 
 afternoon, from the summit of a commanding 
 ridge, I obtained a magnificent view of blue, 
 softly curved mountain scenery. Among the 
 trees I saw Ilex [Holly] for the first time. Mr. 
 . Beale informed me that the paleness of most 
 of the women in his neighborhood, and the 
 mountains in general hereabouts, was caused 
 chiefly by smoking and by what is called "dip- 
 ping." I had never even heard of dipping. The 
 term simply describes the application of snuff 
 to the gum by means of a small swab. 
 
 September 21. Most luxuriant forest. Many 
 brooks running across the road. Blairsville 
 [43 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 [Georgia], which I passed in the forenoon, 
 seems a shapeless and insignificant village, but 
 grandly encircled with banded hills. At night 
 I was cordially received by a farmer whose 
 wife, though smart and neat in her appearance, 
 was an inveterate smoker. 
 
 September 22. Hills becoming small, sparsely 
 covered with soil. They are called "knob land" 
 and are cultivated, or scratched, with a kind 
 of one-tooth cultivator. Every rain robs them 
 of their fertility, while the bottoms are of 
 course correspondingly enriched. About noon 
 I reached the last mountain summit on my 
 way to the sea. It is called the Blue Ridge 
 and before it lies a prospect very different 
 from any I had passed, namely, a vast uniform 
 expanse of dark pine woods, extending to the 
 sea; an impressive view at any time and under 
 any circumstances, but particularly so to one 
 emerging from the mountains. 
 
 Traveled in the wake of three poor but merry 
 mountaineers — an old woman, a young woman, 
 and a young man — who sat, leaned, and lay 
 [44] 
 
The Cumberland Mountains 
 
 in the box of a shackly wagon that seemed to 
 be held together by spiritualism, and was kept 
 in agitation by a very large and a very small 
 mule. In going down hill the looseness of the 
 harness and the joints of the wagon allowed the 
 mules to back nearly out of sight beneath the 
 box, and the three who occupied it were slid 
 against the front boards in a heap over the 
 mules' ears. Before they could unravel their 
 limbs from this unmannerly and impolite dis- 
 order, a new ridge in the road frequently tilted 
 them with a swish and a bump against the 
 back boards in a mixing that was still more 
 grotesque. 
 
 I expected to see man, women, and mules 
 mingled in piebald ruin at the bottom of some 
 rocky hollow, but they seemed to have full 
 confidence in the back board and front board 
 of the wagon-box. So they continued to slide 
 comfortably up and down, from end to end, in 
 slippery obedience to the law of gravitation, as 
 the grades demanded. Where the jolting was 
 moderate, they engaged in conversation on 
 [45] 
 
A "Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 love, marriage, and camp-meeting, according 
 to the custom of the country. The old lady, 
 through all the vicissitudes of the transporta- 
 tion, held a bouquet of French marigolds. 
 
 The hillsides hereabouts were bearing a fine 
 harvest of asters. Reached Mount Yonah in 
 the evening. Had a long conversation with an 
 old Methodist slaveholder and mine owner. 
 Was hospitably refreshed with a drink of fine 
 cider. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THROUGH THE RIVER COUNTRY OF GEORGIA 
 
 SEPTEMBER 23. Am now fairly out of 
 the mountains. Thus far the climate has 
 not changed in any marked degree, the 
 decrease in latitude being balanced by the in- 
 crease in altitude. These mountains are high- 
 ways on which northern plants may extend 
 their colonies southward. The plants of the 
 North and of the South have many minor 
 places of meeting along the way I have trav- 
 eled; but it is here on the southern slope of 
 the Alleghanies that the greatest number of 
 hardy, enterprising representatives of the two 
 climates are assembled. 
 
 Passed the comfortable, finely shaded little 
 town of Gainesville. The Chattahoochee River 
 is richly embanked with massive, bossy, dark 
 green water oaks, and wreathed with a dense 
 growth of muscadine grapevines, whose ornate 
 foliage, so well adapted to bank embroidery, 
 [ 47 1 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile JValk 
 
 was enriched with other interweaving species of 
 vines and brightly colored flowers. This is the 
 first truly southern stream I have met. 
 
 At night I reached the home of a young man 
 with whom I had worked in Indiana, Mr. 
 Prater. He was down here on a visit to his 
 father and mother. This was a plain back- 
 woods family, living out of sight among knobby 
 timbered hillocks not far from the river. The 
 evening was passed in mixed conversation on 
 southern and northern generalities. 
 
 September 24. Spent this day with Mr. Prater 
 sailing on the Chattahoochee, feasting on 
 grapes that had dropped from the overhanging 
 vines. This remarkable species of wild grape 
 has a stout stem, sometimes five or six inches 
 in diameter, smooth bark and hard wood, quite 
 unlike any other wild or cultivated grapevine 
 that I have seen. The grapes are very large, 
 some of them nearly an inch in diameter, 
 globular and fine flavored. Usually there are 
 but three or four berries in a cluster, and when 
 mature they drop off instead of decaying on 
 [48] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 the vine. Those which fall into the river are 
 often found in large quantities in the eddies 
 along the bank, where they are collected by 
 men in boats and sometimes made into 
 wine. I think another name for this grape is 
 the Scuppernong, 1 though called "muscadine" 
 here. 
 
 Besides sailing on the river, we had a long 
 walk among the plant bowers and tangles of 
 the Chattahoochee bottom lands. 
 
 September 2$. Bade good-bye to this friendly 
 family. Mr. Prater accompanied me a short 
 distance from the house and warned me over 
 and over again to be on the outlook for rattle- 
 snakes. They are now leaving the damp low- 
 lands, he told me, so that the danger is much 
 greater because they are on their travels. Thus 
 warned, I set out for Savannah, but got lost 
 in the vine-fenced hills and hollows of the river 
 
 1 The old Indian name for the southern species of fox- 
 grape, Vitis rotundifolia, which Muir describes here. Wood's 
 Botany listed it as Vitis vulpina L. and remarks "The va- 
 riety called 'Scuppernong' is quite common in southern 
 gardens." 
 
 [ 49 ] 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 bottom. Was unable to find the ford to which 
 I had been directed by Mr. Prater. 
 
 I then determined to push on southward 
 regardless of roads and fords. After repeated 
 failures I succeeded in finding a place on the 
 river bank where I could force my way into the 
 stream through the vine-tangles. I succeeded 
 in crossing the river by wading and swimming, 
 careless of wetting, knowing that I would soon 
 dry in the hot sunshine. 
 
 Out near the middle of the river I found 
 great difficulty in resisting the rapid current. 
 Though I braced myseif with a stout stick, I 
 was at length carried away in spite of all my 
 efforts. But I succeeded in swimming to the 
 shallows on the farther side, luckily caught 
 hold of a rock, and after a rest swam and 
 waded ashore. Dragging myself up the steep 
 bank by the overhanging vines, I spread out 
 myself, my paper money, and my plants to 
 dry. 
 
 Debated with myself whether to proceed 
 down the river valley until I could buy a boat, 
 [So] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 or lumber to make one, for a sail instead of 
 a march through Georgia. I was intoxicated 
 with the beauty of these glorious river banks, 
 which I fancied might increase in grandeur as 
 I approached the sea. But I finally concluded 
 that such a pleasure sail would be less profit- 
 able than a walk, and so sauntered on south- 
 ward as soon as I was dry. Rattlesnakes 
 abundant. Lodged at a farmhouse. Found a 
 few tropical plants in the garden. 
 
 Cotton is the principal crop hereabouts, and 
 picking is now going on merrily. Only the lower 
 bolls are now ripe. Those higher on the plants 
 are green and unopened. Higher still, there are 
 buds and flowers, some of which, if the plants 
 be thrifty and the season favorable, will con- 
 tinue to produce ripe bolls until January. 
 
 The negroes are easy-going and merry, mak- 
 ing a great deal of noise and doing little work. 
 One energetic white man, working with a will, 
 would easily pick as much cotton as half a 
 dozen Sambos and Sallies. The forest here is 
 almost entirely made up of dim-green, knotty, 
 [51] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 sparsely planted pines. The soil is mostly white, 
 fine-grained sand. 
 
 September 26. Reached Athens in the after- 
 noon, a remarkably beautiful and aristocratic 
 town, containing many classic and magnificent 
 mansions of wealthy planters, who formerly 
 owned large negro-stocked plantations in the 
 best cotton and sugar regions farther south. 
 Unmistakable marks of culture and refinement, 
 as well as wealth, were everywhere apparent. 
 This is the most beautiful town I have seen on 
 the journey, so far, and the only one in the 
 South that I would like to revisit. 
 
 The negroes here have been well trained and 
 are extremely polite. When they come in sight 
 of a white man on the road, off goes their 
 hats, even at a distance of forty or fifty yards, 
 and they walk bare-headed until he is out of 
 sight. 
 
 September 27. Long zigzag walk amid the 
 old plantations, a few of which are still cul- 
 tivated in the old way by the same negroes 
 that worked them before the war, and who 
 [52] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 still occupy their former "quarters." They are 
 now paid seven to ten dollars a month. 
 
 The weather is very hot on these sandy, 
 lightly shaded, lowland levels. When very 
 thirsty I discovered a beautiful spring in a 
 sandstone basin overhung with shady bushes 
 and vines, where I enjoyed to the utmost the 
 blessing of pure cold water. Discovered here 
 a fine southern fern, some new grasses, etc. 
 Fancied that I might have been directed here 
 by Providence, while fainting with thirst. It 
 is not often hereabouts that the joys of cool 
 water, cool shade, and rare plants are so de- 
 lightfully combined. 
 
 Witnessed the most gorgeous sunset I ever 
 enjoyed, in this bright world of light. The 
 sunny South is indeed sunny. Was directed by 
 a very civil negro to lodgings for the night. 
 Daily bread hereabouts means sweet potatoes 
 and rusty bacon. 
 
 September 28. The water oak is abundant 
 on stream banks and in damp hollows. Grasses 
 are becoming tall and cane-like and do not 
 [53 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile JValk 
 
 cover the ground with their leaves as at the 
 North. Strange plants are crowding about me 
 now. Scarce a familiar face appears among all 
 the flowers of the day's walk. 
 
 September 2Q. To-day I met a magnificent 
 grass, ten or twelve feet in stature, with a 
 superb panicle of glossy purple flowers. Its 
 leaves, too, are of princely mould and dimen- 
 sions. Its home is in sunny meadows and along 
 the wet borders of slow streams and swamps. 
 It seems to be fully aware of its high rank, and 
 waves with the grace and solemn majesty of 
 a mountain pine. I wish I could place one of 
 these regal plants among the grass settlements 
 of our Western prairies. Surely every panicle 
 would wave and bow in joyous allegiance and 
 acknowledge their king. 
 
 September so. Between Thomson and Augusta 
 I found many new and beautiful grasses, tall 
 gerardias, liatris, club mosses, etc. Here, too, 
 is the northern limit of the remarkable long- 
 leafed pine, a tree from sixty to seventy feet 
 in height, from twenty to thirty inches in 
 [54] 
 
A SOUTHERN PINE 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 diameter, with leaves ten to fifteen inches long, 
 in dense radiant masses at the ends of the naked 
 branches. The wood is strong, hard, and very 
 resinous. It makes excellent ship spars, bridge 
 timbers, and flooring. Much of it is shipped to 
 the West India Islands, New York, and Gal- 
 veston. 
 
 The seedlings, five or six years old, are very 
 striking objects to one from the North, con- 
 sisting, as they do, of the straight, leafless 
 stem, surmounted by a crown of deep green 
 leaves, arching and spreading like a palm. 
 Children fancy that they resemble brooms, and 
 use them as such in their picnic play-houses. 
 Pinus palustris is most abundant in Georgia 
 and Florida. 
 
 The sandy soil here is sparingly seamed with 
 rolled quartz pebbles and clay. Denudation, go- 
 ing on slowly, allows the thorough removal of 
 these clay seams, leaving only the sand. Not- 
 withstanding the sandiness of the soil, much of 
 the surface of the country is covered with stand- 
 ing water, which is easily accounted for by the 
 [SSl 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 presence of the above-mentioned impermeable 
 seams. 
 
 Traveled to-day more than forty miles with- 
 out dinner or supper. No family would re- 
 ceive me, so I had to push on to Augusta. Went 
 hungry to bed and awoke with a sore stomach 
 — sore, I suppose, from its walls rubbing on 
 each other without anything to grind. A negro 
 kindly directed me to the best hotel, called, 
 I think, the Planter's. Got a good bed for a 
 dollar. 
 
 October i. Found a cheap breakfast in a 
 market-place; then set off along the Savan- 
 nah River to Savannah. Splendid grasses and 
 rich, dense, vine-clad forests. Muscadine grapes 
 in cart-loads. Asters and solidagoes becoming 
 scarce. Carices [sedges] quite rare. Leguminous 
 plants abundant. A species of passion flower is 
 common, reaching back into Tennessee. It is 
 here called " apricot vine," has a superb flower, 
 and the most delicious fruit I have ever eaten. 
 
 The pomegranate is cultivated here. The 
 fruit is about the size of an orange, has a thick, 
 [56] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 tough skin, and when opened resembles a many- 
 chambered box full of translucent purple 
 candies. 
 
 Toward evening I came to the country of one 
 of the most striking of southern plants, the so- 
 called "Long Moss" or Spanish Moss [Til- 
 landsia], though it is a flowering plant and be- 
 longs to the "same family as the pineapple 
 [Bromelworts]. The trees hereabouts have all 
 their branches draped with it, producing a re- 
 markable effect. 
 
 Here, too, I found an impenetrable cypress 
 swamp. This remarkable tree, called cypress, 
 is a taxodium, grows large and high, and is 
 remarkable for its flat crown. The whole forest 
 seems almost level on the top, as if each tree 
 had grown up against a ceiling, or had been 
 rolled while growing. This taxodium is the 
 only level-topped tree that I have seen. The 
 branches, though spreading, are careful not to 
 pass each other, and stop suddenly on reach- 
 ing the general level, as if they had grown up 
 against a ceiling. 
 
 [S7l 
 
A Thousand- Mile JValk 
 
 The groves and thickets of smaller trees are 
 full of blooming evergreen vines. These vines 
 are not arranged in separate groups, or in deli- 
 cate wreaths, but in bossy walls and heavy, 
 mound-like heaps and banks. Am made to feel 
 that I am now in a strange land. I know hardly 
 any of the plants, but few of the birds, and I 
 am unable to see the country for the solemn, 
 dark, mysterious cypress woods which cover 
 everything. 
 
 The winds are full of strange sounds, making 
 one feel far from the people and plants and fruit- 
 ful fields of home. Night is coming on and I am 
 filled with indescribable loneliness. Felt fever- 
 ish; bathed in a black, silent stream; nervously 
 watchful for alligators. Obtained lodging in a 
 planter's house among cotton fields. Although 
 the family seemed to be pretty well-off, the 
 only light in the house was bits of pitch-pine 
 wood burned in the fireplace. 
 
 October 2. In the low bottom forest of the 
 Savannah River. Very busy with new speci- 
 mens. Most exquisitely planned wrecks of 
 [58] 
 
SPANISH MOSS (Tillandsid) 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 Agrostis scabra [Rough Hair Grass]. Pines in 
 glorious array with open, welcoming, approach- 
 able plants. 
 
 Met a young African with whom I had a long 
 talk. Was amused with his eloquent narrative 
 of coon hunting, alligators, and many super- 
 stitions. He showed me a place where a rail- 
 road train had run off the track, and assured 
 me that the ghosts of the killed may be seen 
 every dark night. 
 
 Had a long walk after sundown. At last was 
 received at the house of Dr. Perkins. Saw Cape 
 Jasmine [Gardenia florida] in the garden. Heard 
 long recitals of war happenings, discussion of 
 the slave question, and Northern politics; a 
 thoroughly characteristic Southern family, re- 
 fined in manners and kind, but immovably 
 prejudiced on everything connected with slav- 
 ery. 
 
 The family table was unlike any I ever saw 
 
 before. It was circular, and the central part 
 
 of it revolved. When any one wished to be 
 
 helped, he placed his plate on the revolving 
 
 [S9l 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 part, which was whirled around to the host, 
 and then whirled back with its new load. Thus 
 every plate was revolved into place, without 
 the assistance of any of the family. 
 
 October 3. In "pine barrens" most of the 
 day. Low, level, sandy tracts ; the pines wide 
 apart ; the sunny spaces between full of beau- 
 tiful abounding grasses, liatris, long, wand- 
 like solidago, saw palmettos, etc., covering the 
 ground in garden style. Here I sauntered in 
 delightful freedom, meeting none of the cat- 
 clawed vines, or shrubs, of the alluvial bot- 
 toms. Dwarf live-oaks common. 
 
 Toward evening I arrived at the home of Mr. 
 Cameron, a wealthy planter, who had large 
 bands of slaves at work in his cotton fields. 
 They still call him "Massa." He tells me that 
 labor costs him less now than it did before the 
 emancipation of the negroes. When I arrived 
 I found him busily engaged in scouring the rust 
 off some cotton-gin saws which had been ly- 
 ing for months at the bottom of his mill-pond 
 to prevent Sherman's "bummers" from des- 
 [60] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 troying them. The most valuable parts of the 
 grist-mill and cotton-press were hidden in 
 the same way. "If Bill Sherman," he said, 
 "should come down now without his army, 
 he would never go back." 
 
 When I asked him if he could give me food 
 and lodging for the night he said, "No, no, we 
 have no accommodations for travelers." I said, 
 "But I am traveling as a botanist and either 
 have to find lodgings when night overtakes me 
 or lie outdoors, which I often have had to do in 
 my long walk from Indiana. But you see that 
 the country here is very swampy; if you will at 
 least sell me a piece of bread, and give me a 
 drink at your well, I shall have to look around 
 for a dry spot to lie down on." 
 
 Then, asking me a few questions, and nar- 
 rowly examining me, he said, "Well, it is 
 barely possible that we may find a place for 
 you, and if you will come to the house I will 
 ask my wife." Evidently he was cautious to get 
 his wife's opinion of the kind of creature I was 
 before committing himself to hospitality. He 
 [61 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 halted me at the door and called out his wife, 
 a fine-looking woman, who also questioned me 
 narrowly as to my object in coming so far down 
 through the South, so soon after the war. She 
 said to her husband that she thought they could, 
 perhaps, give me a place to sleep. 
 
 After supper, as we sat by the fire talking 
 on my favorite subject of botany, I described 
 the country I had passed through, its botani- 
 cal character, etc. Then, evidently, all doubt 
 as to my being a decent man vanished, and 
 they both said that they would n't for any- 
 thing have turned me away; but I must excuse 
 their caution, for perhaps fewer than one in a 
 hundred, who passed through this unfrequented 
 part of the country, were to be relied upon. 
 "Only a short time ago we entertained a man 
 who was well spoken and well dressed, and he 
 vanished some time during the night with some 
 valuable silverware." 
 
 Mr. Cameron told me that when I arrived 
 he tried me for a Mason, and finding that I was 
 not a Mason he wondered still more that I 
 [62] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 would venture into the country without being 
 able to gain the assistance of brother Masons 
 in these troublous times. 
 
 "Young man," he said, after hearing my talks 
 on botany, "I see that your hobby is botany. 
 My hobby is e-lec-tricity. I believe that the 
 time is coming, though we may not live to see 
 it, when that mysterious power or force, used 
 now only for telegraphy, will eventually supply 
 the power for running railroad trains and 
 steamships, for lighting, and, in a word, elec- 
 tricity will do all the work of the world." 
 
 Many times since then I have thought of 
 the wonderfully correct vision of this Georgia 
 planter, so far in advance of almost everybody 
 else in the world. Already nearly all that he 
 foresaw has been accomplished, and the use of 
 electricity is being extended more and more 
 every year. 
 
 October 4. New plants constantly appearing. 
 All day in dense, wet, dark, mysterious forest 
 of flat-topped taxodiums. 
 
 October 5. Saw the stately banana for the 
 [63] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 first time, growing luxuriantly in the wayside 
 gardens. At night with a very pleasant, in- 
 telligent Savannah family, but as usual was 
 admitted only after I had undergone a severe 
 course of questioning. 
 
 October 6. Immense swamps, still more com- 
 pletely fenced and darkened, that are never 
 ruffled with winds or scorched with drought. 
 Many of them seem to be thoroughly aquatic. 
 
 October j. Impenetrable taxodium swamp, 
 seemingly boundless. The silvery skeins of 
 tillandsia becoming longer and more abun- 
 dant. Passed the night with a very pleasant 
 family of Georgians, after the usual questions 
 and cross questions. 
 
 October 8. Found the first woody composites, 
 a most notable discovery. Took them to be 
 such at a considerable distance. Almost all 
 trees and shrubs are evergreens here with thick 
 polished leaves. Magnolia grandiflora becoming 
 common. A magnificent tree in fruit and foli- 
 age as well as in flower. Near Savannah I found 
 waste places covered with a dense growth of 
 [64] 
 
River Country of Georgia 
 
 woody leguminous plants, eight or ten feet 
 high, with pinnate leaves and suspended 
 rattling pods. 
 
 Reached Savannah, but find no word from 
 home, and the money that I had ordered to be 
 sent by express from Portage [Wisconsin] by 
 my brother had not yet arrived. Feel dreadfully 
 lonesome and poor. Went to the meanest look- 
 ing lodging-house that I could find, on account 
 of its cheapness. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 CAMPING AMONG THE TOMBS 
 
 OCTOBER o. After going again to the 
 express office and post office, and wan- 
 dering about the streets, I found a road 
 which led me to the Bonaventure graveyard. 
 If that burying-ground across the Sea of Gali- 
 lee, mentioned in Scripture, was half as beau- 
 tiful as Bonaventure, I do not wonder that a 
 man should dwell among the tombs. It is only 
 three or four miles from Savannah, and is 
 reached by a smooth white shell road. 
 
 There is but little to be seen on the way in 
 land, water, or sky, that would lead one to hope 
 for the glories of Bonaventure. The ragged 
 desolate fields, on both sides of the road, are 
 overrun with coarse rank weeds, and show 
 scarce a trace of cultivation. But soon all is 
 changed. Rickety log huts, broken fences, and 
 the last patch of weedy rice-stubble are left 
 behind. You come to beds of purple liatris and 
 f 66 1 
 
Camping among the 'Tombs 
 
 living wild-wood trees. You hear the song of 
 birds, cross a small stream, and are with Nature 
 in the grand old forest graveyard, so beautiful 
 that almost any sensible person would choose 
 to dwell here with the dead rather than with 
 the lazy, disorderly living. 
 
 Part of the grounds was cultivated and 
 planted with live-oak, about a hundred years 
 ago, by a wealthy gentleman who had his coun- 
 try residence here. But much the greater part 
 is undisturbed. Even those spots which are 
 disordered by art, Nature is ever at work to 
 reclaim, and to make them look as if the foot 
 of man had never known them. Only a small 
 plot of ground is occupied with graves and the 
 old mansion is in ruins. 
 
 The most conspicuous glory of Bonaventure 
 is its noble avenue of live-oaks. They are the 
 most magnificent planted trees I have ever 
 seen, about fifty feet high and perhaps three 
 or four feet in diameter, with broad spreading 
 leafy heads. The main branches reach out 
 horizontally until they come together over the 
 [ 67] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 driveway, embowering it throughout its entire 
 length, while each branch is adorned like a 
 garden with ferns, flowers, grasses, and dwarf 
 palmettos. 
 
 But of all the plants of these curious tree- 
 gardens the most striking and characteristic is 
 the so-called Long Moss {Tillandsia usneoides). 
 It drapes all the branches from top to bottom, 
 hanging in long silvery-gray skeins, reaching a 
 length of not less than eight or ten feet, and 
 when slowly waving in the wind they produce 
 a solemn funereal effect singularly impressive. 
 
 There are also thousands of smaller trees and 
 clustered bushes, covered almost from sight in 
 the glorious brightness of their own light. The 
 place is half surrounded by the salt marshes 
 and islands of the river, their reeds and sedges 
 making a delightful fringe. Many bald eagles 
 roost among the trees along the side of the 
 marsh. Their screams are heard every morning, 
 joined with the noise of crows and the songs of 
 countless warblers, hidden deep in their dwell- 
 ings of leafy bowers. Large flocks of butter- 
 [68] 
 
Camping among the "Tombs 
 
 flies, all kinds of happy insects, seem to be in 
 a perfect fever of joy and sportive gladness. 
 The whole place seems like a center of life. The 
 dead do not reign there alone. 
 
 Bonaventure to me is one of the most impres- 
 sive assemblages of animal and plant creatures 
 I ever met. I was fresh from the Western 
 prairies, the garden-like openings of Wisconsin, 
 the beech and maple and oak woods of Indiana 
 and Kentucky, the dark mysterious Savannah 
 cypress forests; but never since I was allowed 
 to walk the woods have I found so impressive 
 a company of trees as the tillandsia-draped 
 oaks of Bonaventure. 
 
 I gazed awe-stricken as one new-arrived 
 from another world. Bonaventure is called a 
 graveyard, a town of the dead, but the few 
 graves are powerless in such a depth of life. 
 The rippling of living waters, the song of birds, 
 the joyous confidence of flowers, the calm, un- 
 • disturbable grandeur of the oaks, mark this 
 place of graves as one of the Lord's most fa- 
 vored abodes of life and light. 
 [69] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 On no subject are our ideas more warped and 
 pitiable than on death. Instead of the sym- 
 pathy, the friendly union, of life and death so 
 apparent in Nature, we are taught that death 
 is an accident, a deplorable punishment for 
 the oldest sin, the arch-enemy of life, etc. 
 Town children, especially, are steeped in this 
 death orthodoxy, for the natural beauties of 
 death are seldom seen or taught in towns. 
 
 Of death among our own species, to say 
 nothing of the thousand styles and modes of 
 murder, our best memories, even among happy 
 deaths, yield groans and tears, mingled with 
 morbid exultation; burial companies, black in 
 cloth and countenance ; and, last of all, a black 
 box burial in an ill-omened place, haunted by 
 imaginary glooms and ghosts of every degree. 
 Thus death becomes fearful, and the most 
 notable and incredible thing heard around a 
 death-bed is, "I fear not to die." 
 
 But let children walk with Nature, let them 
 see the beautiful blendings and communions of 
 death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, 
 [70] 
 
Camping among the "Tombs 
 
 as taught in woods and meadows, plains and 
 mountains and streams of our blessed star, and 
 they will learn that death is stingless indeed, 
 and as beautiful as life, and that the grave has 
 no victory, for it never fights. All is divine 
 harmony. 
 
 Most of the few graves of Bonaventure are 
 planted with flowers. There is generally a mag- 
 nolia at the head, near the strictly erect marble, 
 a rose-bush or two at the foot, and some violets 
 and showy exotics along the sides or on the 
 tops. All is enclosed by a black iron railing, 
 composed of rigid bars that might have been 
 spears or bludgeons from a battlefield in Pan- 
 demonium. 
 
 It is interesting to observe how assiduously 
 Nature seeks to remedy these labored art blun- 
 ders. She corrodes the iron and marble, and 
 gradually levels the hill which is always heaped 
 up, as if a sufficiently heavy quantity of clods 
 could not be laid on the dead. Arching grasses 
 come one by one ; seeds come flying on downy 
 wings, silent as fate, to give life's dearest beauty 
 [71 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 for the ashes of art ; and strong evergreen arms 
 laden with ferns and tillandsia drapery are 
 spread over all — Life at work everywhere, 
 obliterating all memory of the confusion of man. 
 
 In Georgia many graves are covered with a 
 common shingle roof, supported on four posts 
 as the cover of a well, as if rain and sunshine 
 were not regarded as blessings. Perhaps, in this 
 hot and insalubrious climate, moisture and sun- 
 heat are considered necessary evils to which 
 they do not wish to expose their dead. 
 
 The money package that I was expecting did 
 not arrive until the following week. After stop- 
 ping the first night at the cheap, disreputable- 
 looking hotel, I had only about a dollar and a 
 half left in my purse, and so was compelled to 
 camp out to make it last in buying only bread. 
 I went out of the noisy town to seek a sleeping- 
 place that was not marshy. After gaining the 
 outskirts of the town toward the sea, I found 
 some low sand dunes, yellow with flowering soli- 
 dagoes. 
 
 I wandered wearily from dune to dune sink- 
 [72] 
 
Camping among the Tombs 
 
 ing ankle-deep in the sand, searching for a 
 place to sleep beneath the tall flowers, free from 
 insects and snakes, and above all from my fel- 
 low man. But idle negroes were prowling about 
 everywhere, and I was afraid. The wind had 
 strange sounds, waving the heavy panicles 
 over my head, and I feared sickness from ma- 
 laria so prevalent here, when I suddenly thought 
 of the graveyard. 
 
 "There," thought I, "is an ideal place for 
 a penniless wanderer. There no superstitious 
 prowling mischief maker dares venture for fear 
 of haunting ghosts, while for me there will be 
 God's rest and peace. And then, if I am to be ex- 
 posed to unhealthy vapors, I shall have capital 
 compensation in seeing those grand oaks in 
 the moonlight, with all the impressive and 
 nameless influences of this lonely beautiful 
 place." 
 
 By this time it was near sunset, and I has- 
 tened across the common to the road and set off 
 for Bonaventure, delighted with my choice, and 
 almost glad to find that necessity had furnished 
 [73 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 me with so good an excuse for doing what I 
 knew my mother would censure ; for she made 
 me promise I would not lie out of doors if I 
 could possibly avoid it. The sun was set ere 
 I was past the negroes' huts and rice fields, 
 and I arrived near the graves in the silent hour 
 of the gloaming. 
 
 I was very thirsty after walking so long in 
 the muggy heat, a distance of three or four 
 miles from the city, to get to this graveyard. 
 A dull, sluggish, coffee-colored stream flows 
 under the road just outside the graveyard gar- 
 den park, from which I managed to get a drink 
 after breaking a way down to the water through 
 a dense fringe of bushes, daring the snakes and 
 alligators in the dark. Thus refreshed I entered 
 the weird and beautiful abode of the dead. 
 
 All the avenue where I walked was in 
 shadow, but an exposed tombstone frequently 
 shone out in startling whiteness on either hand, 
 and thickets of sparkleberry bushes gleamed 
 like heaps of crystals. Not a breath of air moved 
 the gray moss, and the great black arms of the 
 [74] 
 
Camping among the Tombs 
 
 trees met overhead and covered the avenue. 
 But the canopy was fissured by many a netted 
 seam and leafy-edged opening, through which 
 the moonlight sifted in auroral rays, broidering 
 the blackness in silvery light. Though tired, 
 I sauntered a while enchanted, then lay down 
 under one of the great oaks. I found a little 
 mound that served for a pillow, placed my 
 plant press and bag beside me and rested fairly 
 well, though somewhat disturbed by large 
 prickly-footed beetles creeping across my hands 
 and face, and by a lot of hungry stinging mo- 
 squitoes. 
 
 When I awoke, the sun was up and all Na- 
 ture was rejoicing. Some birds had discovered 
 me as an intruder, and were making a great 
 ado in interesting language and gestures. I 
 heard the screaming of the bald eagles, and of 
 some strange waders in the rushes. I heard the 
 hum of Savannah with the long jarring hallos 
 of negroes far away. On rising I found that my 
 head had been resting on a grave, and though 
 my sleep had not been quite so sound as that 
 [75 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 of the person below, I arose refreshed, and look- 
 ing about me, the morning sunbeams pouring 
 through the oaks and gardens dripping with 
 dew, the beauty displayed was so glorious and 
 exhilarating that hunger and care seemed only 
 a dream. 
 
 Eating a breakfast cracker or two and watch- 
 ing for a few hours the beautiful light, birds, 
 squirrels, and insects, I returned to Savannah, 
 to find that my money package had not yet ar- 
 rived. I then decided to go early to the grave- 
 yard and make a nest with a roof to keep off 
 the dew, as there was no way of finding out how 
 long I might have to stay. I chose a hidden 
 spot in a dense thicket of sparkleberry bushes, 
 near the right bank of the Savannah River, 
 where the bald eagles and a multitude of sing- 
 ing birds roosted. It was so well hidden that 
 I had to carefully fix its compass bearing in my 
 mind from a mark I made on the side of the 
 main avenue, that I might be able to find it at 
 bedtime. 
 
 I used four of the bushes as corner posts for 
 [76] 
 
Camping among the Tombs 
 
 my little hut, which was about four or five feet 
 long by about three or four in width, tied 
 little branches across from forks in the bushes 
 to support a roof of rushes, and spread a thick 
 mattress of Long Moss over the floor for a bed. 
 My whole establishment was on so small a 
 scale that I could have taken up, not only my 
 bed, but my whole house, and walked. There 
 I lay that night, eating a few crackers. 
 
 Next day I returned to the town and was 
 disappointed as usual in obtaining money. So 
 after spending the day looking at the plants in 
 the gardens of the fine residences and town 
 squares, I returned to my graveyard home. 
 That I might not be observed and suspected 
 of hiding, as if I had committed a crime, I 
 always went home after dark, and one night, 
 as I lay down in my moss nest, I felt some 
 cold-blooded creature in it; whether a snake 
 or simply a frog or toad I do not know, but 
 instinctively, instead of drawing back my 
 hand, I grasped the poor creature and threw 
 it over the tops of the bushes. That was 
 [77] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 the only significant disturbance or fright that 
 I got. 
 
 In the morning everything seemed divine. 
 Only squirrels, sunbeams, and birds came 
 about me. I was awakened every morning by 
 these little singers after they discovered my 
 nest. Instead of serenely singing their morning 
 songs they at first came within two or three 
 feet of the hut, and, looking in at me through 
 the leaves, chattered and scolded in half-angry, 
 half-wondering tones. The crowd constantly 
 increased, attracted by the disturbance. Thus 
 I began to get acquainted with my bird neigh- 
 bors in this blessed wilderness, and after they 
 learned that I meant them no ill they scolded 
 less and sang more. 
 
 After five days of this graveyard life I saw 
 that even with living on three or four cents a 
 day my last twenty-five cents would soon be 
 spent, and after trying again and again unsuc- 
 cessfully to find some employment began to 
 think that I must strike farther out into the 
 country, but still within reach of town, until 
 [78] 
 
Camping among the Tombs 
 
 I came to some grain or rice field that had 
 not yet been harvested, trusting that I could 
 live indefinitely on toasted or raw corn, or 
 rice. 
 
 By this time I was becoming faint, and in 
 making the journey to the town was alarmed to 
 find myself growing staggery and giddy. The 
 ground ahead seemed to be rising up in front 
 of me, and the little streams in the ditches on 
 the sides of the road seemed to be flowing up 
 hill. Then I realized that I was becoming dan- 
 gerously hungry and became more than ever 
 anxious to receive that money package. 
 
 To my delight this fifth or sixth morning, 
 when I inquired if the money package had 
 come, the clerk replied that it had, but that he 
 could not deliver it without my being identi- 
 fied. I said, "Well, here! read my brother's 
 letter," handing it to him. "It states the 
 amount in the package, where it came from, 
 the day it was put into the office at Portage 
 City, and I should think that would be enough." 
 He said, "No, that is not enough. How do I 
 [79] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 know that this letter is yours ? You may have 
 stolen it. How do I know that you are John 
 Muir?" 
 
 I said, "Well, don't you see that this letter 
 indicates that I am a botanist? For in it my 
 brother says, ' I hope you are having a good time 
 and finding many new plants/ Now, you say 
 that I might have stolen this letter from John 
 Muir, and in that way have become aware of 
 there being a money package to arrive from 
 Portage for him. But the letter proves that 
 John Muir must be a botanist, and though, as 
 you say, his letter might have been stolen, it 
 would hardly be likely that the robber would 
 be able to steal John Muir's knowledge of 
 botany. Now I suppose, of course, that you 
 have been to school and know something of 
 botany. Examine me and see if I know any- 
 thing about it." 
 
 At this he laughed good-naturedly, evidently 
 
 feeling the force of my argument, and, perhaps, 
 
 pitying me on account of looking pale and 
 
 hungry, he turned and rapped at the door of 
 
 [80] 
 
Camping among the "Tombs 
 
 a private office — probably the Manager's — 
 called him out and said, "Mr. So and So, here 
 is a man who has inquired every day for the 
 last week or so for a money package from Por- 
 tage, Wisconsin. He is a stranger in the city 
 with no one to identify him. He states correctly 
 the amount and the name of the sender. He has 
 shown me a letter which indicates that Mr. 
 Muir is a botanist, and that although a travel- 
 ing companion may have stolen Mr. Muir's 
 letter, he could not have stolen his botany, and 
 requests us to examine him." 
 
 The head official smiled, took a good stare 
 into my face, waved his hand, and said, "Let 
 him have it." Gladly I pocketed my money, 
 and had not gone along the street more than 
 a few rods before I met a very large negro 
 woman with a tray of gingerbread, in which I 
 immediately invested some of my new wealth, 
 and walked rejoicingly, munching along the 
 street, making no attempt to conceal the plea- 
 sure I had in eating. Then, still hunting for 
 more food, I found a sort of eating-place in 
 [81 ] 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 a market and had a large regular meal on 
 top of the gingerbread! Thus my "marching 
 through Georgia" terminated handsomely in a 
 jubilee of bread. 
 
 4 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THROUGH FLORIDA SWAMPS AND FORESTS 
 
 OF the people of the States that I have 
 now passed, I best like the Georgians. 
 They have charming manners, and 
 their dwellings are mostly larger and better 
 than those of adjacent States. However costly 
 or ornamental their homes or their manners, 
 they do not, like those of the New Englander, 
 appear as the fruits of intense and painful sac- 
 rifice and training, but are entirely divested of 
 artificial weights and measures, and seem to 
 pervade and twine about their characters as 
 spontaneous growths with the durability and 
 charm of living nature. 
 
 In particular, Georgians, even the common- 
 est, have a most charmingly cordial way of say- 
 ing to strangers, as they proceed on their jour- 
 ney, "I wish you well, sir." The negroes of 
 Georgia, too, are extremely mannerly and po- 
 lite, and appear always to be delighted to find 
 opportunity for obliging anybody. 
 [83 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 Athens contains many beautiful residences. 
 I never before saw so much about a home that 
 was so evidently done for beauty only, although 
 this is by no means a universal characteristic of 
 Georgian homes. Nearly all well-to-do farmers' 
 families in Georgia and Tennessee spin and 
 weave their own cloth. This work is almost all 
 done by the mothers and daughters and con- 
 sumes much of their time. 
 
 The traces of war are not only apparent on 
 the broken fields, burnt fences, mills, and woods 
 ruthlessly slaughtered, but also on the counte- 
 nances of the people. A few years after a forest 
 has been burned another generation of bright 
 and happy trees arises, in purest, freshest vigor; 
 only the old trees, wholly or half dead, bear 
 marks of the calamity. So with the people of 
 this war-field. Happy, unscarred, and unclouded 
 youth is growing up around the aged, half- 
 consumed, and fallen parents, who bear in sad 
 measure the ineffaceable marks of the farth- 
 est-reaching and most infernal of all civilized 
 calamities. 
 
 [84] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 Since the commencement of my floral pil- 
 grimage I have seen much that is not only new, 
 but altogether unallied, unacquainted with the 
 plants of my former life. I have seen magno- 
 lias, tupelo, live-oak, Kentucky oak, tilland- 
 sia, long-leafed pine, palmetto, schrankia, and 
 whole forests of strange trees and vine-tied 
 thickets of blooming shrubs; whole meadow- 
 fuls of magnificent bamboo and lakefuls of lilies, 
 all new to me; yet I still press eagerly on to 
 Florida as the special home of the tropical 
 plants I am looking for, and I feel sure I shall 
 not be disappointed. 
 
 The same day on which the money arrived 
 I took passage on the steamship Sylvan Shore 
 for Fernandina, Florida. The daylight part of 
 this sail along the coast of Florida was full of 
 novelty, and by association awakened memories 
 of my Scottish days at Dunbar on the Firth of 
 Forth. 
 
 On board I had civilized conversation with a 
 Southern planter on topics that are found float- 
 ing in the mind of every white man down here 
 [8 5 ] 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 who has a single thought. I also met a brother- 
 Scotchman, who was especially interesting and 
 had some ideas outside of Southern politics. 
 Altogether my half-day and night on board the 
 steamer were pleasant, and carried me past 
 a very sickly, entangled, overflowed, and un- 
 walkable piece of forest. 
 
 It is pretty well known that a short geologi- 
 cal time ago the ocean covered the sandy level 
 margin, extending from the foot of the Alle- 
 ghanies to the present coast-line, and in re- 
 ceding left many basins for lakes and swamps. 
 The land is still encroaching on the sea, and it 
 does so not evenly, in a regular line, but in 
 fringing lagoons and inlets and dotlike coral 
 islands. 
 
 It is on the coast strip of isles and peninsulas 
 that sea-island cotton is grown. Some of these 
 small islands are afloat, anchored only by the 
 roots of mangroves and rushes. For a few 
 hours our steamer sailed in the open sea, ex- 
 posed to its waves, but most of the time 
 she threaded her way among the lagoons, the 
 [ 86] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 home of alligators and countless ducks and 
 waders. 
 
 October 15. To-day, at last, I reached Florida, 
 the so-called "Land of Flowers," that I had so 
 long waited for, wondering if after all my long- 
 ings and prayers would be in vain, and I should 
 die without a glimpse of the flowery Canaan. 
 But here it is, at the distance of a few yards ! 
 — a flat, watery, reedy coast, with clumps of 
 mangrove and forests of moss-dressed, strange 
 trees appearing low in the distance. The steamer 
 finds her way among the reedy islands like a 
 duck, and I step on a rickety wharf. A few steps 
 more take me to a rickety town, Fernandina. 
 I discover a baker, buy some bread, and with- 
 out asking a single question, make for the 
 shady, gloomy groves. 
 
 In visiting Florida in dreams, of either day 
 or night, I always came suddenly on a close 
 forest of trees, every one in flower, and bent 
 down and entangled to network by luxuriant, 
 bright-blooming vines, and over all a flood of 
 bright sunlight. But such was not the gate 
 [87] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 by which I entered the promised land. Salt 
 marshes, belonging more to the sea than to the 
 land ; with groves here and there, green and un- 
 flowered, sunk to the shoulders in sedges and 
 rushes; with trees farther back, ill defined in 
 their boundary, and instead of rising in hilly 
 waves and swellings, stretching inland in low 
 water-like levels. 
 
 We were all discharged by the captain of the 
 steamer without breakfast, and, after meeting 
 and examining the new plants that crowded 
 about me, I threw down my press and little 
 bag beneath a thicket, where there was a dry 
 spot on some broken heaps of grass and roots, 
 something like a deserted muskrat house, and 
 applied myself to my bread breakfast. Every- 
 thing in earth and sky had an impression of 
 strangeness ; not a mark of friendly recognition, 
 not a breath, not a spirit whisper of sympathy 
 came from anything about me, and of course 
 I was lonely. I lay on my elbow eating my 
 bread, gazing, and listening to the profound 
 strangeness. 
 
 [88] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 While thus engaged I was startled from these 
 gatherings of melancholy by a rustling sound 
 in the rushes behind me. Had my mind been 
 in health, and my body not starved, I should 
 only have turned calmly to the noise. But in 
 this half-starved, unfriended condition I could 
 have no healthy thought, and I at once believed 
 that the sound came from an alligator. I fan- 
 cied I could feel the stroke of his long notched 
 tail, and could see his big jaws and rows of 
 teeth, closing with a springy snap on me, as I 
 had seen in pictures. 
 
 Well, I don't know the exact measure of my 
 fright either in time or pain, but when I did 
 come to a knowledge of the truth, my man- 
 eating alligator became a tall white crane, hand- 
 some as a minister from spirit land — "only 
 that." I was ashamed and tried to excuse my- 
 self on account of Bonaventure anxiety and 
 hunger. 
 
 Florida is so watery and vine-tied that path- 
 less wanderings are not easily possible in any 
 direction. I started to cross the State by a gap 
 [89] 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 hewn for the locomotive, walking sometimes 
 between the rails, stepping from tie to tie, or 
 walking on the strip of sand at the sides, gazing 
 into the mysterious forest, Nature's own. It is 
 impossible to write the dimmest picture of 
 plant grandeur so redundant, unfathomable. 
 ) Short was the measure of my walk to-day. 
 A new, canelike grass, or big lily, or gorgeous 
 flower belonging to tree or vine, would catch 
 my attention, and I would throw down my bag 
 and press and splash through the coffee-brown 
 water for specimens. Frequently I sank deeper 
 and deeper until compelled to turn back and 
 make the attempt in another and still another 
 place. Oftentimes I was tangled in a laby- 
 rinth of armed vines like a fly in a spider-web. 
 At all times, whether wading or climbing a tree 
 for specimens of fruit, I was overwhelmed with 
 the vastness and unapproachableness of the 
 great guarded sea of sunny plants. 
 
 Magnolia grandiflora I had seen in Georgia; 
 but its home, its better land, is here. Its 
 large dark-green leaves, glossy bright above 
 [ 90 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 and rusty brown beneath, gleam and mirror 
 the sunbeams most gloriously among countless 
 flower-heaps of the climbing, smothering vines. 
 It is bright also in fruit and more tropical in 
 form and expression than the orange. It speaks 
 itself a prince among its fellows. 
 
 Occasionally, I came to a little strip of open 
 sand, planted with pine {Pinus palustris or 
 Cubensis). Even these spots were mostly wet, 
 though lighted with free sunshine, and adorned 
 with purple liatris, and orange-colored Osmunda 
 cinnamomea. But the grandest discovery of 
 this great wild day was the palmetto. 
 
 I was meeting so many strange plants that I 
 was much excited, making many stops to get 
 specimens. But I could not force my way far 
 through the swampy forest, although so tempt- 
 ing and full of promise. Regardless of water 
 snakes or insects, I endeavored repeatedly to 
 force a way through the tough vine-tangles, 
 but seldom succeeded in getting farther than a 
 few hundred yards. 
 
 It was while feeling sad to think that I was 
 [91 1 
 
dl Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 only walking on the edge of the vast wood, that 
 I caught sight of the first palmetto in a grassy- 
 place, standing almost alone. A few magnolias 
 were near it, and bald cypresses, but it was not 
 shaded by them. They tell us that plants are 
 perishable, soulless creatures, that only man is 
 immortal, etc. ; but this, I think, is something 
 that we know very nearly nothing about. Any- 
 how, this palm was indescribably impressive 
 and told me grander things than I ever got 
 from human priest. 
 
 This vegetable has a plain gray shaft, round 
 as a broom-handle, and a crown of varnished 
 channeled leaves. It is a plainer plant than the 
 humblest of Wisconsin oaks ; but, whether rock- 
 ing and rustling in the wind or poised thought- 
 ful and calm in the sunshine, it has a power of 
 expression not excelled by any plant high or low 
 that I have met in my whole walk thus far. 
 
 This, my first specimen, was not very tall, 
 
 only about twenty-five feet high, with fifteen or 
 
 twenty leaves, arching equally and evenly all 
 
 around. Each leaf was about ten feet in length, 
 
 [92] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 the blade four feet, the stalk six. The leaves are 
 channeled like half-open clams and are highly- 
 polished, so that they reflect the sunlight like 
 glass. The undeveloped leaves on the top stand 
 erect, closely folded, all together forming an 
 oval crown over which the tropic light is poured 
 and reflected from its slanting mirrors in sparks 
 and splinters and long-rayed stars. 
 
 I am now in the hot gardens of the sun, where 
 the palm meets the pine, longed and prayed for 
 and often visited in dreams, and, though lonely 
 to-night amid this multitude of strangers, strange 
 plants, strange winds blowing gently, whis- 
 pering, cooing, in a language I never learned, 
 and strange birds also, everything solid or 
 spiritual full of influences that I never before 
 felt, yet I thank the Lord with all my heart for 
 his goodness in granting me admission to this 
 magnificent realm. 
 
 October 16. Last evening when I was in the 
 trackless woods, the great mysterious night be- 
 coming more mysterious in the thickening dark- 
 ness, I gave up hope of finding food or a house 
 [93 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile J^alk 
 
 bed, and searched only for a dry spot on which 
 to sleep safely hidden from wild, runaway ne- 
 groes. I walked rapidly for hours in the wet, 
 level woods, but not a foot of dry ground could 
 I find. Hollow-voiced owls were calling with- 
 out intermission. All manner of night sounds 
 came from strange insects and beasts, one 
 by one, or crowded together. All had a home 
 but I. Jacob on the dry plains of Padan- 
 aram, with a stone pillow, must have been 
 comparatively happy. 
 
 When I came to an open place where pines 
 grew, it was about ten o'clock, and I thought 
 that now at last I would find dry ground. But 
 even the sandy barren was wet, and I had to 
 grope in the dark a long time, feeling the ground 
 with my hands when my feet ceased to plash, 
 before I at last discovered a little hillock dry 
 enough to lie down on. I ate a piece of bread 
 that I fortunately had in my bag, drank some 
 of the brown water about my precious hillock, 
 and lay down. The noisiest of the unseen 
 witnesses around me were the owls, who pro- 
 [94] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 nounced their gloomy speeches with profound 
 emphasis, but did not prevent the coming of 
 sleep to heal weariness. 
 
 In the morning I was cold and wet with dew, 
 and I set out breakfastless. Flowers and beauty 
 I had in abundance, but no bread. A serious 
 matter is this bread which perishes, and, could 
 it be dispensed with, I doubt if civilization would 
 ever see me again. I walked briskly, watching 
 for a house, as well as the grand assemblies of 
 novel plants. 
 
 Near the middle of the forenoon I came to a 
 shanty where a party of loggers were getting 
 out long pines for ship spars. They were the 
 wildest of all the white savages I have met. 
 The long-haired ex-guerrillas of the mountains 
 of Tennessee and North Carolina are uncivil- 
 ized fellows ; but for downright barbarism these 
 Florida loggers excel. Nevertheless, they gave 
 me a portion of their yellow pork and hominy 
 without either apparent hospitality or a grudge, 
 and I was glad to escape to the forest again. 
 
 A few hours later I dined with three men and 
 [95 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 three dogs. I was viciously attacked by the lat- 
 ter, who undertook to undress me with their 
 teeth. I was nearly dragged down backward, 
 but escaped unbitten. Liver pie, mixed with 
 sweet potatoes and fat duff, was set before me, 
 and after I had finished a moderate portion, 
 one of the men, turning to his companion, re- 
 marked: "Wall, I guess that man quit eatin* 
 'cause he had nothin' more to eat. I '11 get him 
 more potato." 
 
 Arrived at a place on the margin of a stag- 
 nant pool where an alligator had been rolling 
 and sunning himself. "See," said a man who 
 lived here, " see, what a track that is ! He must 
 have been a mighty big fellow. Alligators wal- 
 low like hogs and like to lie in the sun. I 'd like 
 a shot at that fellow." Here followed a long re- 
 cital of bloody combats with the scaly enemy, 
 in many of which he had, of course, taken an 
 important part. Alligators are said to be ex- 
 tremely fond of negroes and dogs, and natu- 
 rally the dogs and negroes are afraid of them. 
 
 Another man that I met to-day pointed to a 
 [96] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 shallow, grassy pond before his door. "There," 
 said he, "I once had a tough fight with an alli- 
 gator. He caught my dog. I heard him howl- 
 ing, and as he was one of my best hunters I 
 tried hard to save him. The water was only 
 about knee-deep and I ran up to the alligator. 
 It was only a small one about four feet long, 
 and was having trouble in its efforts to drown 
 the dog in the shallow water. I scared him and 
 made him let go his hold, but before the poor 
 crippled dog could reach the shore, he was 
 caught again, and when I went at the alligator 
 with a knife, it seized my arm. If it had been a 
 little stronger it might have eaten me instead 
 of my dog." 
 
 I never in all my travels saw more than one, 
 though they are said to be abundant in most of 
 the swamps, and frequently attain a length of 
 nine or ten feet. It is reported, also, that they 
 are very savage, oftentimes attacking men in 
 boats. These independent inhabitants of the 
 sluggish waters of this low coast cannot be 
 called the friends of man, though I heard of 
 [97] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 one big fellow that was caught young and was 
 partially civilized and made to work in harness. 
 
 Many good people believe that alligators 
 were created by the Devil, thus accounting for 
 their all-consuming appetite and ugliness. But 
 doubtless these creatures are happy and fill the 
 place assigned them by the great Creator of 
 us all. Fierce and cruel they appear to us, but 
 beautiful in the eyes of God. They, also, are 
 his children, for He hears their cries, cares for 
 them tenderly, and provides their daily bread. 
 
 The antipathies existing in the Lord's great 
 animal family must be wisely planned, like 
 balanced repulsion and attraction in the min- 
 eral kingdom. How narrow we selfish, con- 
 ceited creatures are in our sympathies! how 
 blind to the rights of all the rest of creation! 
 With what dismal irreverence we speak of our 
 fellow mortals ! Though alligators, snakes, etc., 
 naturally repel us, they are not mysterious 
 evils. They dwell happily in these flowery 
 wilds, are part of God's family, unfallen, un- 
 depraved, and cared for with the same species 
 [93] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 of tenderness and love as is bestowed on angels 
 in heaven or saints on earth. 
 
 I think that most of the antipathies which 
 haunt and terrify us are morbid productions of 
 ignorance and weakness. I have better thoughts 
 of those alligators now that I have seen them 
 at home. Honorable representatives of the 
 great saurians of an older creation, may you 
 long enjoy your lilies and rushes, and be 
 blessed now and then with a mouthful of ter- 
 ror-stricken man by way of dainty ! 
 
 Found a beautiful lycopodium to-day, and 
 many grasses in the dry sunlit places called 
 "barrens," "hummocks," "savannas," etc. 
 Ferns also are abundant. What a flood of heat 
 and light is daily poured out on these beauti- 
 ful openings and intertangled woods! "The 
 land of the sunny South," we say, but no 
 part of our diversified country is more shaded 
 and covered from sunshine. Many a sunny 
 sheet of plain and prairie break the continuity 
 of the forests of the North and West, and the 
 forests themselves are mostly lighted also, 
 [99] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 pierced with direct ray lances, or [the sun- 
 light] passing to the earth and the lowly plants 
 in filtered softness through translucent leaves. 
 But in the dense Florida forests sunlight can- 
 not enter. It falls on the evergreen roof and 
 rebounds in long silvery lances and flashy 
 spray. In many places there is not light suffi- 
 cient to feed a single green leaf on these dark 
 forest floors. All that the eye can reach is just 
 a maze of tree stems and crooked leafless vine 
 strings. All the flowers, all the verdure, all the 
 glory is up in the light. 
 
 The streams of Florida are still young, and 
 in many places are untraceable. I expected to 
 find these streams a little discolored from the 
 vegetable matter that I knew they must con- 
 tain, and I was sure that in so flat a country I 
 should not find any considerable falls or long 
 rapids. The streams of upper Georgia are al- 
 most unapproachable in some places on ac- 
 count of luxuriant bordering vines, but the 
 banks are nevertheless high and well defined. 
 Florida streams are not yet possessed of banks 
 \ ioo 1 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 and braes and definite channels. Their waters 
 in deep places are black as ink, perfectly 
 opaque, and glossy on the surface as if var- 
 nished. It often is difficult to ascertain which 
 way they are flowing or creeping, so slowly 
 and so widely do they circulate through the 
 tree-tangles and swamps of the woods. The 
 flowers here are strangers to me, but not more 
 so than the rivers and lakes. Most streams ap- 
 pear to travel through a country with thoughts 
 and plans for something beyond. But those of 
 Florida are at home, do not appear to be travel- 
 ing at all, and seem to know nothing of the sea. 
 October iy. Found a small, silvery-leafed 
 magnolia, a bush ten feet high. Passed through 
 a good many miles of open level pine barrens, 
 as bounteously lighted as the "openings" of 
 Wisconsin. The pines are rather small, are 
 planted sparsely and pretty evenly on these 
 sandy flats not long risen from the sea. Scarcely 
 a specimen of any other tree is to be found as- 
 sociated with the pine. But there are some 
 thickets of the little saw palmettos and a mag- 
 [ ioi ] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 nificent assemblage of tall grasses, their splen- 
 did panicles waving grandly in the warm wind, 
 and making low tuneful changes in the glis- 
 tening light that is flashed from their bent 
 stems. 
 
 Not a pine, not a palm, in all this garden 
 excels these stately grass plants in beauty of 
 wind-waving gestures. Here are panicles that 
 are one mass of refined purple ; others that have 
 flowers as yellow as ripe oranges, and stems pol- 
 ished and shining like steel wire. Some of the 
 species are grouped in groves and thickets like 
 trees, while others may be seen waving without 
 any companions in sight. Some of them have 
 wide-branching panicles like Kentucky oaks, 
 others with a few tassels of spikelets drooping 
 from a tall, leafless stem. But all of them are 
 beautiful beyond the reach of language. I re- 
 joice that God has "so clothed the grass of the 
 field." How strangely we are blinded to beauty 
 and color, form and motion, by comparative 
 size! For example, we measure grasses by our 
 own stature and by the height and bulkiness 
 [ 102 ] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 of trees. But what is the size of the greatest 
 man, or the tallest tree that ever overtopped 
 a grass ! Compared with other things in God's 
 creation the difference is nothing. We all are 
 only microscopic animalcula. 
 
 October 18. Am walking on land that is almost 
 dry. The dead levels are interrupted here and 
 there by sandy waves a few feet in height. It 
 is said that not a point in all Florida is more 
 than three hundred feet above sea-level — a 
 country where but little grading is required for 
 roads, but much bridging, and boring of many 
 tunnels through forests. 
 
 Before reaching this open ground, in a lonely, 
 swampy place in the woods, I met a large, mus- 
 cular, brawny young negro, who eyed me with 
 glaring, wistful curiosity. I was very thirsty 
 at the time, and inquired of the man if there 
 were any houses or springs near by where I 
 could get a drink. "Oh, yes," he replied, still 
 eagerly searching me with his wild eyes. Then 
 ,he inquired where I came from, where I was 
 going, and what brought me to such a wild 
 [ 103 ] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 country, where I was liable to be robbed, and 
 perhaps killed. 
 
 "Oh, I am not afraid of any one robbing 
 me," I said, "for I don't carry anything worth 
 stealing." "Yes," said he, "but you can't 
 travel without money." I started to walk on, 
 but he blocked my way. Then I noticed that he 
 was trembling, and it flashed upon me all at 
 once that he was thinking of knocking me down 
 in order to rob me. After glaring at my pockets 
 as if searching for weapons, he stammered in 
 a quavering voice, "Do you carry shooting- 
 irons?" His motives, which I ought to have 
 noted sooner, now were apparent to me. Though 
 I had no pistol, I instinctively threw my hand 
 back to my pistol pocket and, with my eyes 
 fixed on his, I marched up close to him and 
 said, "I allow people to find out if I am armed 
 or not." Then he quailed, stepped aside, and 
 allowed me to pass, for fear of being shot. This 
 was evidently a narrow escape. 
 
 A few miles farther on I came to a cotton- 
 field, to patches of sugar cane carefully fenced, 
 [ 104 1 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 and some respectable-looking houses with gar- 
 dens. These little fenced fields look as if they 
 were intended to be for plants what cages are 
 for birds. Discovered a large, treelike cactus 
 in a dooryard; a small species was abundant 
 on the sand-hillocks. Reached Gainesville late 
 in the night. 
 
 When within three or four miles of the town 
 I noticed a light off in the pine woods. As I was 
 very thirsty, I thought I would venture toward 
 it with the hope of obtaining water. In creep- 
 ing cautiously and noiselessly through the 
 grass to discover whether or no it was a camp 
 of robber negroes, I came suddenly in full view 
 of the best-lighted and most primitive of all 
 the domestic establishments I have yet seen 
 in town or grove. There was, first of all, a big, 
 glowing log fire, illuminating the overleaning 
 bushes and trees, bringing out leaf and spray 
 with more than noonday distinctness, and 
 making still darker the surrounding wood. In 
 the center of this globe of light sat two negroes. 
 I could see their ivory gleaming from the great 
 [ ios 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 lips, and their smooth cheeks flashing off light 
 as if made of glass. Seen anywhere but in the 
 South, the glossy pair would have been taken 
 for twin devils, but here it was only a negro 
 and his wife at their supper. 
 
 I ventured forward to the radiant presence 
 of the black pair, and, after being stared at 
 with that desperate fixedness which is said to 
 subdue the lion, I was handed water in a gourd 
 from somewhere out of the darkness. I was 
 standing for a moment beside the big fire, look- 
 ing at the unsurpassable simplicity of the es- 
 tablishment, and asking questions about the 
 road to Gainesville, when my attention was 
 called to a black lump of something lying in 
 the ashes of the fire. It seemed to be made 
 of rubber; but ere I had time for much specu- 
 lation, the woman bent wooingly over the 
 black object and said with motherly kindness, 
 "Come, honey, eat yo' hominy." 
 
 At the sound of " hominy" the rubber gave 
 strong manifestations of vitality and proved to 
 be a burly little negro boy, rising from the earth 
 [ 106] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 naked as to the earth he came. Had he emerged 
 from the black muck of a marsh, we might eas- 
 ily have believed that the Lord had manufac- 
 tured him like Adam direct from the earth. 
 
 Surely, thought I, as I started for Gaines- 
 ville, surely I am now coming to the tropics, 
 where the inhabitants wear nothing but their 
 own skins. This fashion is sufficiently simple, 
 — "no troublesome disguises," as Milton calls 
 clothing, — but it certainly is not quite in har- 
 mony with Nature. Birds make nests and 
 nearly all beasts make some kind of bed for their 
 young; but these negroes allow their younglings 
 to lie nestless and naked in the dirt. 
 
 Gainesville is rather attractive — an oasis 
 in the desert, compared with other villages. 
 Its gets its life from the few plantations located 
 about it on dry ground that rises islandlike a 
 few feet above the swamps. Obtained food and 
 lodging at a sort of tavern. 
 
 October ig. Dry land nearly all day. Encoun- 
 tered limestone, flint, coral, shells, etc. Passed 
 several thrifty cotton plantations with com- 
 [ 107 ] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 fortable residences, contrasting sharply with 
 the squalid hovels of my first days in Florida. 
 Found a single specimen of a handsome little 
 plant, which at once, in some mysterious way, 
 brought to mind a young friend in Indiana. 
 How wonderfully our thoughts and impressions 
 are stored! There is that in the glance of a 
 flower which may at times control the greatest 
 of creation's braggart lords. 
 
 The magnolia is much more abundant here. 
 It forms groves and almost exclusively forests 
 the edges of ponds and the banks of streams. 
 The easy, dignified simplicity of this noble tree, 
 its plain leaf endowed with superb richness of 
 color and form, its open branches festooned with 
 graceful vines and tillandsia, its showy crim- 
 son fruit, and its magnificent fragrant white 
 flowers make Magnolia grandiflora the most 
 lovable of Florida trees. 
 
 Discovered a great many beautiful poly- 
 gonums, petalostemons, and yellow leguminous 
 vines. Passed over fine sunny areas of the long- 
 leafed and Cuban pines, which were every- 
 [ 108 ] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 where accompanied by fine grasses and solida- 
 goes. Wild orange groves are said to be rather 
 common here, but I have seen only limes grow- 
 ing wild in the woods. 
 
 Came to a hut about noon, and, being weary 
 and hungry, asked if I could have dinner. After 
 serious consultation I was told to wait, that 
 dinner would soon be ready. I saw only the 
 man and his wife. If they had children, they 
 may have been hidden in the weeds on account 
 of nakedness. Both were suffering from ma- 
 larial fever, and were very dirty. But they did 
 not appear to have any realizing sense of dis- 
 comfort from either the one or the other of 
 these misfortunes. The dirt which encircled 
 the countenances of these people did not, like 
 the common dirt of the North, stick on the 
 skin in bold union like plaster or paint, but 
 appeared to stand out a little on contact like a 
 hazy, misty, half-aerial mud envelope, the most 
 diseased and incurable dirt that I ever saw, 
 evidently desperately chronic and hereditary. 
 
 It seems impossible that children from such 
 [ 109 ] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 parents could ever be clean. Dirt and dis- 
 ease are dreadful enough when separate, but 
 combined are inconceivably horrible. The 
 neat cottage with a fragrant circumference of 
 thyme and honeysuckle is almost unknown 
 here. I have seen dirt on garments regularly 
 stratified, the various strata no doubt indi- 
 cating different periods of life. Some of them, 
 perhaps, were annual layers, furnishing, like 
 those of trees, a means of determining the 
 age. Man and other civilized animals are the 
 only creatures that ever become dirty. 
 
 Slept in the barrens at the side of a log. Suf- 
 fered from cold and was drenched with dew. 
 What a comfort a companion would be in the 
 dark loneliness of such nights! Did not dare 
 to make a fire for fear of discovery by robber 
 negroes, who, I was warned, would kill a man 
 for a dollar or two. Had a long walk after night- 
 fall, hoping to discover a house. Became very 
 thirsty and often was compelled to drink from 
 slimy pools groped for in the grass, with the 
 fear of alligators before my eyes. 
 [ no] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 October 20. Swamp very dense during this 
 day's journey. Almost one continuous sheet 
 of water covered with aquatic trees and vines. 
 No stream that I crossed to-day appeared to 
 have the least idea where it was going. Saw 
 an alligator plash into the sedgy brown water 
 by the roadside from an old log. 
 
 Arrived at night at the house of Captain 
 Simmons, one of the very few scholarly, intel- 
 ligent men that I have met in Florida. He had 
 been an officer in the Confederate army in the 
 war and was, of course, prejudiced against the 
 North, but polite and kind to me, nevertheless. 
 Our conversation, as we sat by the light of the 
 fire, was on the one great question, slavery 
 and its concomitants. I managed, however, to 
 switch off to something more congenial occa- 
 sionally — the birds of the neighborhood, the 
 animals, the climate, and what spring, summer, 
 and winter are like in these parts. 
 
 About the climate, I could not get much in- 
 formation, as he had always lived in the South 
 and, of course, saw nothing extraordinary in 
 [ in 1 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 weather to which he had always been accus- 
 tomed. But in speaking of animals, he at once 
 became enthusiastic and told many stories of 
 hairbreadth escapes, in the woods about his 
 house, from bears, hungry alligators, wounded 
 deer, etc. "And now," said he, forgetting in his 
 kindness that I was from the hated North, 
 "you must stay with me a few days. Deer are 
 abundant. I will lend you a rifle and we'll go 
 hunting. I hunt whenever I wish venison, and 
 I can get it about as easily from the woods 
 near by as a shepherd can get mutton out of 
 his flock. And perhaps we will see a bear, for 
 they are far from scarce here, and there are 
 some big gray wolves, too." 
 
 I expressed a wish to see some large alli- 
 gators. "Oh, well," said he, "I can take you 
 where you will see plenty of those fellows, but 
 they are not much to look at. I once got a good 
 look at an alligator that was lying at the bottom 
 of still, transparent water, and I think that his 
 eyes were the most impressively cold and cruel 
 of any animal I have seen. Many alligators go 
 [ 112 1 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 out to sea among the keys. These sea alli- 
 gators are the largest and most ferocious, and 
 sometimes attack people by trying to strike 
 them with their tails when they are out fishing 
 in boats. 
 
 "Another thing I wish you to see," he con- 
 tinued, "is a palmetto grove on a rich hum- 
 mock a few miles from here. The grove is 
 about seven miles in length by three in breadth. 
 The ground is covered with long grass, unin- 
 terrupted with bushes or other trees. It is the 
 finest grove of palmettos I have ever seen and 
 I have oftentimes thought that it would make 
 a fine subject for an artist." 
 
 I concluded to stop — more to see this won- 
 derful palmetto hummock than to hunt. Be- 
 sides, I was weary and the prospect of getting 
 a little rest was a tempting consideration after 
 so many restless nights and long, hard walks 
 by day. 
 
 October 21. Having outlived the sangui- 
 nary hunters' tales of my loquacious host, and 
 breakfasted sumptuously on fresh venison and 
 1 113 ] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 "caller" fish from the sea, I set out for the 
 grand palm grove. I had seen these dazzling 
 sun-children in every day of my walk through 
 Florida, but they were usually standing soli- 
 tary, or in groups of three or four; but to-day 
 I was to see them by the mile. The captain 
 led me a short distance through his corn field 
 and showed me a trail which would conduct 
 me to the palmy hummock. He pointed out 
 the general direction, which I noted upon my 
 compass. 
 
 "Now," said he, "at the other side of my 
 farthest field you will come to a jungle of cat- 
 briers, but will be able to pass them if you 
 manage to keep the trail. You will find that 
 the way is not by any means well marked, for 
 in passing through a broad swamp, the trail 
 makes a good many abrupt turns to avoid deep 
 water, fallen trees, or impenetrable thickets. 
 You will have to wade a good deal, and in pass- 
 ing the water-covered places you will have to 
 watch for the point where the trail comes out 
 on the opposite side." 
 
 [114] 
 
A FLORIDA PALMETTO HUMMOCK, OR "HAMMOCK 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 I made my way through the briers, which in 
 strength and ferocity equaled those of Tennes- 
 see,' followed the path through all of its dim 
 waverings, waded the many opposing pools, 
 and, emerging suddenly from the leafy dark- 
 ness of the swamp forest, at last stood free 
 and unshaded on the border of the sun-drenched 
 palm garden. It was a level area of grasses and 
 sedges, smooth as a prairie, well starred with 
 flowers, and bounded like a clearing by a wall 
 of vine-laden trees. 
 
 The palms had full possession and appeared 
 to enjoy their sunny home. There was no 
 jostling, no apparent effort to outgrow each 
 other. Abundance of sunlight was there for 
 every crown, and plenty to fall between. I 
 walked enchanted in their midst. What a 
 landscape! Only palms as far as the eye could 
 reach! Smooth pillars rising from the grass, 
 each capped with a sphere of leaves, shining 
 in the sun as bright as a star. The silence and 
 calm were as deep as ever I found in the dark, 
 solemn pine woods of Canada, and that con- 
 [ «S] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 tentment which is an attribute of the best of 
 God's plant people was as impressively felt 
 in this alligator wilderness as in the homes of 
 the happy, healthy people of the North. 
 
 The admirable Linnaeus calls palms "the 
 princes of the vegetable world." I know that 
 there is grandeur and nobility in their char- 
 acter, and that there are palms nobler far than 
 these. But in rank they appear to me to stand 
 below both the oak and the pine. The motions 
 of the palms, their gestures, are not very grace- 
 ful. They appear to best advantage when per- 
 fectly motionless in the noontide calm and in- 
 tensity of light. But they rustle and rock in 
 the evening wind. I have seen grasses waving 
 with far more dignity. And when our northern 
 pines are waving and bowing in sign of wor- 
 ship with the winter storm-winds, where is the 
 prince of palms that could have the conscience 
 to demand their homage! 
 
 Members of this palm congregation were of 
 all sizes with respect to their stems; but their 
 glorious crowns were all alike. In develop- 
 [116] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 ment there is only the terminal bud to con- 
 sider. The young palm of this species emerges 
 from the ground in full strength, one cluster 
 of leaves arched every way, making a sphere 
 about ten or twelve feet in diameter. The out- 
 side lower leaves gradually become yellow, 
 wither, and break off, the petiole snapping 
 squarely across, a few inches from the stem. 
 New leaves develop with wonderful rapidity. 
 They stand erect at first, but gradually arch 
 outward as they expand their blades and 
 lengthen their petioles. 
 
 New leaves arise constantly from the center 
 of the grand bud, while old ones break away 
 from the outside. The splendid crowns are 
 thus kept about the same size, perhaps a little 
 larger than in youth while they are yet on the 
 ground. As the development of the central 
 axis goes on, the crown is gradually raised on a 
 stem of about six to twelve inches in diameter. 
 This stem is of equal thickness at the top and 
 at the bottom and when young is roughened 
 with the broken petioles. But these petiole- 
 [ 117] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 stumps fall off and disappear as they become 
 old, and the trunk becomes smooth as if turned 
 in a lathe. 
 
 After some hours in this charming forest I 
 started on the return journey before night, 
 on account of the difficulties of the swamp and 
 the brier patch. On leaving the palmettos and 
 entering the vine-tangled, half-submerged for- 
 est I sought long and carefully, but in vain, for 
 the trail, for I had drifted about too incau- 
 tiously in search of plants. But, recollecting 
 the direction that I had followed in the morn- 
 ing, I took a compass bearing and started to 
 penetrate the swamp in a direct line. 
 
 Of course I had a sore weary time, pushing 
 through the tanglement of falling, standing, and 
 half-fallen trees and bushes, to say nothing of 
 knotted vines as remarkable for their efficient 
 army of interlocking and lancing prickers as for 
 their length and the number of their blossoms. 
 But these were not my greatest obstacles, nor 
 yet the pools and lagoons full of dead leaves 
 and alligators. It was the army of cat-briers 
 [ n8 ] 
 

 
 aJ~~ 
 
 /?%,f.. t^rC^ f*^ 
 
 
 
 PAGE OF JOURNAL WITH SKETCH SHOWING PALMETTOS IN 
 DIFFERENT STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 that I most dreaded. I knew that I would have 
 to find the narrow slit of a lane before dark or 
 spend the night with mosquitoes and alligators, 
 without food or fire. The entire distance was 
 not great, but a traveler in open woods can form 
 no idea of the crooked and strange difficulties 
 of pathless locomotion in these thorny, watery 
 Southern tangles, especially in pitch darkness. 
 I struggled hard and kept my course, leaving 
 the general direction only when drawn aside 
 by a plant of extraordinary promise, that I 
 wanted for a specimen, or when I had to make 
 the half-circuit of a pile of trees, or of a deep 
 lagoon or pond. 
 
 In wading I never attempted to keep my 
 clothes dry, because the water was too deep, 
 and the necessary care would consume too much 
 time. Had the water that I was forced to wade 
 been transparent it would have lost much of its 
 difficulty. But as it was, I constantly expected 
 to plant my feet on an alligator, and therefore 
 proceeded with strained caution. The opacity 
 of the water caused uneasiness also on account 
 1 119] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 of my inability to determine its depth. In many 
 places I was compelled to turn back, after 
 wading forty or fifty yards, and to try again 
 a score of times before I succeeded in getting 
 across a single lagoon. 
 
 At length, after miles of wading and wallow- 
 ing, I arrived at the grand cat-brier encamp- 
 ment which guarded the whole forest in solid 
 phalanx, unmeasured miles up and down across 
 my way. Alas! the trail by which I had crossed 
 in the morning was not to be found, and night 
 was near. In vain I scrambled back and forth 
 in search of an opening. There was not even a 
 strip of dry ground on which to rest. Every- 
 where the long briers arched over to the vines 
 and bushes of the watery swamp, leaving 
 no standing-ground between them. I began to 
 think of building some sort of a scaffold in a 
 tree to rest on through the night, but concluded 
 to make one more desperate effort to find the 
 narrow track. 
 
 After calm, concentrated recollection of my 
 course, I made a long exploration toward the 
 [ 120 ] 
 
Florida Swamps and Forests 
 
 left down the brier line, and after scrambling a 
 mile or so, perspiring and bleeding, I discov- 
 ered the blessed trail and escaped to dry land 
 and the light. Reached the captain at sun- 
 down. Dined on milk and johnny-cake and 
 fresh venison. Was congratulated on my sin- 
 gular good fortune and woodcraft, and soon 
 after supper was sleeping the deep sleep of 
 the weary and the safe. 
 
 October 22. This morning I was easily pre- 
 vailed upon by the captain and an ex-judge, 
 who was rusticating here, to join in a deer hunt. 
 Had a delightful ramble in the long grass and 
 flowery barrens. Started one deer but did not 
 draw a single shot. The captain, the judge, 
 and myself stood at different stations where the 
 deer was expected to pass, while a brother of the 
 captain entered the woods to arouse the game 
 from cover. The one deer that he started took 
 a direction different from any which this par- 
 ticular old buck had ever been known to take 
 in times past, and in so doing was cordially 
 
 cursed as being the "d dest deer that ever 
 
 [ 121 ] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 ran unshot." To me it appeared as " d dest " 
 
 work to slaughter God's cattle for sport. "They 
 were made for us," say these self-approving 
 preachers; "for our food, our recreation, or 
 other uses not yet discovered." As truthfully 
 we might say on behalf of a bear, when he 
 deals successfully with an unfortunate hunter, 
 "Men and other bipeds were made for bears, 
 and thanks be to God for claws and teeth so 
 long." 
 
 Let a Christian hunter go to the Lord's 
 woods and kill his well-kept beasts, or wild In- 
 dians, and it is well; but let an enterprising 
 specimen of these proper, predestined victims 
 go to houses and fields and kill the most worth- 
 less person of the vertical godlike killers, — 
 oh! that is horribly unorthodox, and on the 
 part of the Indians atrocious murder! Well, 
 I have precious little sympathy for the selfish 
 propriety of civilized man, and if a war of races 
 should occur between the wild beasts and Lord 
 Man, I would be tempted to sympathize with 
 the bears. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 CEDAR KEYS 
 
 OCTOBER 23. To-day I reached the 
 sea. While I was yet many miles back 
 in the palmy woods, I caught the 
 scent of the salt sea breeze which, although I 
 had so many years lived far from sea breezes, 
 suddenly conjured up Dunbar, its rocky coast, 
 winds and waves; and my whole childhood, 
 that seemed to have utterly vanished in the 
 New World, was now restored amid the Florida 
 woods by that one breath from the sea. For- 
 gotten were the palms and magnolias and the 
 thousand flowers that enclosed me. I could 
 see only dulse and tangle, long-winged gulls, 
 the Bass Rock in the Firth of Forth, and the 
 old castle, schools, churches, and long coun- 
 try rambles in search of birds' nests. I do not 
 wonder that the weary camels coming from 
 the scorching African deserts should be able to 
 scent the Nile. 
 
 [ 123 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 How imperishable are all the impressions 
 that ever vibrate one's life ! We cannot forget 
 anything. Memories may escape the action of 
 will, may sleep a long time, but when stirred 
 by the right influence, though that influence be 
 light as a shadow, they flash into full stature 
 and life with everything in place. For nineteen 
 years my vision was bounded by forests, but 
 to-day, emerging from a multitude of tropical 
 plants, I beheld the Gulf of Mexico stretching 
 away unbounded, except by the sky. What 
 dreams and speculative matter for thought 
 arose as I stood on the strand, gazing out on 
 the burnished, treeless plain! 
 
 But now at the seaside I was in difficulty. I 
 had reached a point that I could not ford, and 
 Cedar Keys had an empty harbor. Would I pro- 
 ceed down the peninsula to Tampa and Key 
 West, where I would be sure to find a vessel 
 for Cuba, or would I wait here, like Crusoe, and 
 pray for a ship. Full of these thoughts, I 
 stepped into a little store which had a con- 
 siderable trade in quinine and alligator and 
 [ 124 ] 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 rattlesnake skins, and inquired about shipping, 
 means of travel, etc. 
 
 The proprietor informed me that one of sev- 
 eral sawmills near the village was running, and 
 that a schooner chartered to carry a load of 
 lumber to Galveston, Texas, was expected at 
 the mills for a load. This mill was situated on 
 a tongue of land a few miles along the coast 
 from Cedar Keys, and I determined to see Mr. 
 Hodgson, the owner, to find out particulars 
 about the expected schooner, the time she 
 would take to load, whether I would be likely 
 to obtain passage on her, etc. 
 
 Found Mr. Hodgson at his mill. Stated my 
 case, and was kindly furnished the desired in- 
 formation. I determined to wait the two weeks 
 likely to elapse before she sailed, and go on her 
 to the flowery plains of Texas, from any of 
 whose ports, I fancied, I could easily find pas- 
 sage to the West Indies. I agreed to work for 
 Mr. Hodgson in the mill until I sailed, as I had 
 but little money. He invited me to his spacious 
 house, which occupied a shell hillock and com- 
 [125] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 manded a fine view of the Gulf and many gems 
 of palmy islets, called "keys/* that fringe the 
 shore like huge bouquets — not too big, how- 
 ever, for the spacious waters. Mr. Hodgson's 
 family welcomed me with that open, uncon- 
 strained cordiality which is characteristic of the 
 better class of Southern people. 
 
 At the sawmill a new cover had been put on 
 the main driving pulley, which, made of rough 
 plank, had to be turned off and smoothed. 
 He asked me if I was able to do this job and I 
 told him that I could. Fixing a rest and mak- 
 ing a tool out of an old file, I directed the engi- 
 neer to start the engine and run slow. After 
 turning down the pulley and getting it true, 
 I put a keen edge on a common carpenter's 
 plane, quickly finished the job, and was assigned 
 a bunk in one of the employees' lodging-houses. 
 
 The next day I felt a strange dullness and 
 headache while I was botanizing along the coast. 
 Thinking that a bath in the salt water might 
 refresh me, I plunged in and swam a little dis- 
 tance, but this seemed only to make me feel 
 [ 126] 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 worse. I felt anxious for something sour, and 
 walked back to the village to buy lemons. 
 
 Thus and here my long walk was interrupted. 
 I thought that a few days' sail would land me 
 among the famous flower-beds of Texas. But 
 the expected ship came and went while I was 
 helpless with fever. The very day after reach- 
 ing the sea I began to be weighed down by in- 
 exorable leaden numbness, which I resisted and 
 tried to shake off for three days, by bathing in 
 the Gulf, by dragging myself about among the 
 palms, plants, and strange shells of the shore, 
 and by doing a little mill work. I did not fear 
 any serious illness, for I never was sick before, 
 and was unwilling to pay attention to my feel- 
 ings. 
 
 But yet heavier and more remorselessly 
 pressed the growing fever, rapidly gaining on 
 my strength. On the third day after my arrival 
 I could not take any nourishment, but craved 
 acid. Cedar Keys was only a mile or two dis- 
 tant, and I managed to walk there to buy 
 lemons. On returning, about the middle of the 
 [ 127 ] 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 afternoon, the fever broke on me like a storm, 
 and before I had staggered halfway to the mill 
 I fell down unconscious on the narrow trail 
 among dwarf palmettos. 
 
 When I awoke from the hot fever sleep, the 
 stars were shining, and I was at a loss to know 
 which end of the trail to take, but fortunately, 
 as it afterwards proved, I guessed right. Sub- 
 sequently, as Lfell again and again after walk- 
 ing only a hundred yards or so, I was careful 
 to lie with my head in the direction in which 
 I thought the mill was. I rose, staggered, and 
 fell, I know not how many times, in delirious 
 bewilderment, gasping and throbbing with only 
 moments of consciousness. Thus passed the 
 hours till after midnight, when I reached the 
 mill lodging-house. 
 
 The watchman on his rounds found me lying 
 on a heap of sawdust at the foot of the stairs. 
 I asked him to assist me up the steps to bed, 
 but he thought my difficulty was only intoxica- 
 tion and refused to help me. The mill hands, 
 especially on Saturday nights, often returned 
 1 128 ] 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 from the village drunk. This was the cause of 
 the watchman's refusal. Feeling that I must 
 get to bed, I made out to reach it on hands and 
 knees, tumbled in after a desperate struggle, and 
 immediately became oblivious to everything. 
 
 I awoke at a strange hour on a strange day 
 to hear Mr. Hodgson ask a watcher beside 
 me whether I had yet spoken, and when he 
 replied that I had not, he said: "Well, you must 
 keep on pouring in quinine. That's all we can 
 do." How long I lay unconscious I never 
 found out, but it must have been many days. 
 Some time or other I was moved on a horse 
 from the mill quarters to Mr. Hodgson's house, 
 where I was nursed about three months with 
 unfailing kindness, and to the skill and care of 
 Mr. and Mrs. Hodgson I doubtless owe my life. 
 Through quinine and calomel — in sorry abun- 
 dance — with other milder medicines, my ma- 
 larial fever became typhoid. I had night 
 sweats, and my legs became like posts of the 
 temper and consistency of clay on account of 
 dropsy. So on until January, a weary time. 
 [ 129 ] 
 
A "Thousand-Mile JValk 
 
 As soon as I was able to get out of bed, I crept 
 away to the edge of the wood, and sat day after 
 day beneath a moss-draped live-oak, watching 
 birds feeding on the shore when the tide was 
 out. Later, as I gathered some strength, I 
 sailed in a little skiff from one key to another. 
 Nearly all the shrubs and trees here are ever- 
 green, and a few of the smaller plants are in 
 flower all winter. The principal trees on this 
 Cedar Key are the juniper, long-leafed pine, 
 and live-oak. All of the latter, living and dead, 
 are heavily draped with tillandsia, like those 
 of Bonaventure. The leaf is oval, about two 
 inches long, three fourths of an inch wide, 
 glossy and dark green above, pale beneath. 
 The trunk is usually much divided, and is ex- 
 tremely unwedgeable. The specimen on the op- 
 posite page 1 is growing in the dooryard of Mr. 
 Hodgson's house. It is a grand old king, whose 
 crown gleamed in the bright sky long ere the 
 Spanish shipbuilders felled a single tree of this 
 noble species. 
 
 1 Of the original journal. 
 [ 130 1 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 The live-oaks of these keys divide empire 
 with the long-leafed pine and palmetto, but in 
 many places on the mainland there are large 
 tracts exclusively occupied by them. Like the 
 Bonaventure oaks they have the upper side of 
 their main spreading branches thickly planted 
 with ferns, grasses, small saw palmettos, etc. 
 There is also a dwarf oak here, which forms 
 dense thickets. The oaks of this key are not, 
 like those of the Wisconsin openings, growing 
 on grassy slopes, but stand, sunk to the shoul- 
 ders, in flowering magnolias, heathworts, etc. 
 I During my long sojourn here as a convales- 
 cent I used to lie on my back for whole days 
 beneath the ample arms of these great trees, 
 listening to the winds and the birds. There 
 is an extensive shallow on the coast, close by, 
 which the receding tide exposes daily. This is 
 the feeding-ground of thousands of waders of 
 all sizes, plumage, and language, and they 
 make a lively picture and noise when they 
 gather at the great family board to eat their 
 daily bread, so bountifully provided for them. 
 [ 131 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 Their leisure in time of high tide they spend 
 in various ways and places. Some go in large 
 flocks to reedy margins about the islands and 
 wade and stand about quarrelling or making 
 sport, occasionally finding a stray mouthful to 
 eat. Some stand on the mangroves of the soli- 
 tary shore, now and then plunging into the 
 water after a fish. Some go long journeys in- 
 land, up creeks and inlets. [A few lonely old 
 herons of solemn look and wing retire to favor- 
 ite oaks. It was my delight to watch those 
 old white sages of immaculate feather as they 
 stood erect drowsing away the dull hours be- 
 tween tides, curtained by long skeins of til- 
 landsia. White-bearded hermits gazing dream- 
 ily from dark caves could not appear more sol- 
 emn or more becomingly shrouded from the 
 rest of their fellow beings. 
 
 One of the characteristic plants of these keys 
 is the Spanish bayonet, a species of yucca, 
 about eight or ten feet in height, and with a 
 trunk three or four inches in diameter when 
 full grown. It belongs to the lily family and 
 [ 132 1 
 
Cedar Key: 
 
 develops palmlike from terminal buds. The 
 stout leaves are very rigid, sharp-pointed and 
 bayonet-like. By one of these leaves a man 
 might be as seriously stabbed as by an army 
 bayonet, and woe to the luckless wanderer who 
 dares to urge his way through these armed 
 gardens after dark. Vegetable cats of many 
 species will rob him of his clothes and claw his 
 flesh, while dwarf palmettos will saw his bones, 
 and the bayonets will glide to his joints and 
 marrow without the smallest consideration for 
 Lord Man. 
 
 The climate of these precious^islets is sim- 
 ply warm summer and warmer summer, corre- 
 sponding in time with winter and summer in the 
 North. The weather goes smoothly over the 
 points of union betwixt the twin summers. Few 
 of the storms are very loud or variable. The 
 average temperature during the day, in De- 
 cember, was about sixty-five degrees in the 
 shade, but on one day a little damp snow fell. 
 
 Cedar Key is two and one half or three miles 
 in diameter and its highest point is forty-four 
 1 i33 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 feet above mean tide-water. It is surrounded 
 by scores of other keys, many of them looking 
 like a clump of palms, arranged like a tasteful 
 bouquet, and placed in the sea to be kept fresh. 
 Others have quite a sprinkling of oaks and 
 junipers, beautifully united with vines. Still 
 others consist of shells, with a few grasses and 
 mangroves, circled with a rim of rushes. Those 
 which have sedgy margins furnish a favorite 
 retreat for countless waders and divers, espe- 
 cially for the pelicans that frequently whiten 
 the shore like a ring of foam. 
 
 It is delightful to observe the assembling of 
 these feathered people from the woods and 
 reedy isles ; herons white as wave-tops, or blue 
 as the sky, winnowing the warm air on wide 
 quiet wing; pelicans coming with baskets to 
 fill, and the multitude of smaller sailors of the 
 air, swift as swallows, gracefully taking their 
 places at Nature's family table for their daily 
 bread. Happy birds ! 
 
 The mockingbird is graceful in form and a 
 fine singer, plainly dressed, rather familiar in 
 [ 134 1 
 
*\'\ * 
 
 I 
 
 V 
 
 in 
 
 I; 
 
 I; % 
 
 J^> N 
 
 
 o j= 
 
 * -a 
 
Cedar Keyi 
 
 habits, frequently coming like robins to door- 
 sills for crumbs — a noble fellow, beloved by 
 everybody. Wild geese are abundant in winter, 
 associated with brant, some species of which 
 I have never seen in the North. Also great 
 flocks of robins, mourning doves, bluebirds, 
 and the delightful brown thrashers. A large 
 number of the smaller birds are fine singers. 
 Crows, too, are here, some of them cawing with 
 a foreign accent. The common bob-white quail 
 I observed as far south as middle Georgia. 
 
 Lime Key, sketched on the opposite page, is 
 a fair specimen of the Florida keys on this part 
 of the coast. A fragment of cactus, Opuntia, 
 sketched on another page, 1 is from the above- 
 named key, and is abundant there. The fruit, 
 an inch in length, is gathered, and made into 
 a sauce, of which some people are fond. This 
 species forms thorny, impenetrable thickets. 
 One joint that I measured was fifteen inches 
 long. 
 
 The mainland of Florida is less salubrious 
 
 1 Of the original journal. 
 1 135 1 
 
A 'Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 than the islands, but no portion of this coast, 
 nor of the flat border which sweeps from Mary- 
 land to Texas, is quite free from malaria. All 
 the inhabitants of this region, whether black or 
 white, are liable to be prostrated by the ever- 
 present fever and ague, to say nothing of the 
 plagues of cholera and yellow fever that come 
 and go suddenly like storms, prostrating the 
 population and cutting gaps in it like hurri- 
 canes in woods. 
 
 The world, we are told, was made especially 
 for man — a presumption not supported by all 
 the facts. A numerous class of men are pain- 
 fully astonished whenever they find anything, 
 living or dead, in all God's universe, which they 
 cannot eat or render in some way what they 
 call useful to themselves. They have precise 
 dogmatic insight of the intentions of the Crea- 
 tor, and it is hardly possible to be guilty of ir- 
 reverence in speaking of their God any more 
 than of heathen idols. He is regarded as a civ- 
 ilized, law-abiding gentleman in favor either 
 of a republican form of government or of a 
 [ 136] 
 
Cedar Key: 
 
 limited monarchy; believes in the literature 
 and language of England; is a warm supporter 
 of the English constitution and Sunday schools 
 and missionary societies; and is as purely a 
 manufactured article as any puppet of a half- 
 penny theater. 
 
 With such views of the Creator it is, of course, 
 not surprising that erroneous views should be 
 entertained of the creation. To such properly 
 trimmed people, the sheep, for example, is an 
 easy problem — food and clothing "for us," 
 eating grass and daisies white by divine appoint- 
 ment for this predestined purpose, on perceiv- 
 ing the demand for wool that would be occa- 
 sioned by the eating of the apple in the Garden 
 of Eden. 
 
 In the same pleasant plan, whales are store- 
 houses of oil for us, to help out the stars in 
 lighting our dark ways until the discovery of the 
 Pennsylvania oil wells. Among plants, hemp, 
 to say nothing of the cereals, is a case of evident 
 destination for ships' rigging, wrapping pack- 
 ages, and hanging the wicked. Cotton is an- 
 [ i37 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 other plain case of clothing. Iron was made 
 for hammers and ploughs, and lead for bullets ; 
 all intended for us. And so of other small hand- 
 fuls of insignificant things. 
 
 But if we should ask these profound ex- 
 positors of God's intentions, How about those 
 man-eating animals — lions, tigers, alligators 
 — which smack their lips over raw man? Or 
 about those myriads of noxious insects that 
 destroy labor and drink his blood? Doubtless 
 man was intended for food and drink for all 
 these ? Oh, no ! Not at all ! These are unresolv- 
 able difficulties connected with Eden's apple and 
 the Devil. Why does water drown its lord? 
 Why do so many minerals poison him? Why 
 are so many plants and fishes deadly enemies? 
 Why is the lord of creation subjected to the 
 same laws of life as his subjects? Oh, all these 
 things are satanic, or in some way connected 
 with the first garden. 
 
 Now, it never seems to occur to these far- 
 seeing teachers that Nature's object in making 
 animals and plants might possibly be first of 
 [ 138 1 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 all the happiness of each one of them, not the 
 creation of all for the happiness of one. Why 
 should man value himself as more than a small 
 part of the one great unit of creation? And 
 what creature of all that the Lord has taken 
 the pains to make is not essential to the com- 
 pleteness of that unit — the cosmos ? The uni- 
 verse would be incomplete without man; but 
 it would also be incomplete without the small- 
 est transmicroscopic creature that dwells be- 
 yond our conceitful eyes and knowledge. 
 
 From the dust of the earth, from the common 
 elementary fund, the Creator has made Homo 
 sapiens. From the same material he has made 
 every other creature, however noxious and in- 
 significant to us. They are earth-born com- 
 panions and our fellow mortals. The fearfully 
 good, the orthodox, of this laborious patch- 
 work of modern civilization cry "Heresy" on 
 every one whose sympathies reach a single 
 hair's breadth beyond the boundary epider- 
 mis of our own species. Not content with taking 
 all of earth, they also claim the celestial coun- 
 [ i39 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 try as the only ones who possess the kind of 
 souls for which that imponderable empire was 
 planned. 
 
 This star, our own good earth, made many 
 a successful journey around the heavens ere 
 man was made, and whole kingdoms of crea- 
 tures enjoyed existence and returned to dust 
 ere man appeared to claim them. After human 
 beings have also played their part in Creation's 
 plan, they too may disappear without any 
 general burning or extraordinary commotion 
 whatever. 
 
 Plants are credited with but dim and uncer- 
 tain sensation, and minerals with positively 
 none at all. But why may not even a mineral 
 arrangement of matter be endowed with sensa- 
 tion of a kind that we in our blind exclusive 
 perfection can have no manner of communica- 
 tion with? 
 
 But I have wandered from my object. I 
 
 stated a page or two back that man claimed 
 
 the earth was made for him, and I was going 
 
 to say that venomous beasts, thorny plants, 
 
 [ 140 ] 
 
Cedar Keys 
 
 and deadly diseases of certain parts of the earth 
 prove that the whole world was not made for 
 him. When an animal from a tropical climate 
 is taken to high latitudes, it may perish of cold, 
 and we say that such an animal was never in- 
 tended for so severe a climate. But when man 
 betakes himself to sickly parts of the tropics 
 and perishes, he cannot see that he was never 
 intended for such deadly climates. No, he will 
 rather accuse the first mother of the cause of 
 the difficulty, though she may never have seen 
 a fever district ; or will consider it a providen- 
 tial chastisement for some self-invented form 
 of sin. 
 
 Furthermore, all uneatable and uncivilizable 
 animals, and all plants which carry prickles, are 
 deplorable evils which, according to closet re- 
 searches of clergy, require the cleansing chem- 
 istry of universal planetary combustion. But 
 more than aught else mankind requires burn- 
 ing, as being in great part wicked, and if that 
 transmundane furnace can be so applied and 
 regulated as to smelt and purify us into con- 
 [ 141 1 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 formity with the rest of the terrestrial creation, 
 then the tophetization of the erratic genus 
 Homo were a consummation devoutly to be 
 prayed for. But, glad to leave these ecclesias- 
 tical fires and blunders, I joyfully return to 
 the immortal truth and immortal beauty of 
 Nature. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 A SOJOURN IN CUBA 
 
 ONE day in January I climbed to the 
 housetop to get a view of another of 
 the fine sunsets of this land of flowers. 
 The landscape was a strip of clear Gulf water, a 
 strip of sylvan coast, a tranquil company of shell 
 and coral keys, and a gloriously colored sky 
 without a threatening cloud. All the winds 
 were hushed and the calm of the heavens was 
 as profound as that of the palmy islands and 
 their encircling waters. As I gazed from one 
 to another of the palm-crowned keys, en- 
 closed by the sunset-colored dome, my eyes 
 chanced to rest upon the fluttering sails of a 
 Yankee schooner that was threading the tor- 
 tuous channel in the coral reef leading to the 
 harbor of Cedar Keys. "There," thought I, 
 "perhaps I may sail in that pretty white 
 moth." She proved to be the schooner Island 
 Belle. 
 
 [i43 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 One day soon after her arrival I went over 
 the key to the harbor, for I was now strong 
 enough to walk. Some of her crew were ashore 
 after water. I waited until their casks were 
 filled, and went with them to the vessel in their 
 boat. Ascertained that she was ready to sail 
 with her cargo of lumber for Cuba. I engaged 
 passage on her for twenty-five dollars, and 
 asked her sharp-visaged captain when he would 
 sail. "Just as soon," said he, "as we get a 
 north wind. We have had northers enough 
 when we did not want them, and now we have 
 this dying breath from the south." 
 
 Hurrying back to the house, I gathered my 
 plants, took leave of my kind friends, and 
 went aboard, and soon, as if to calm the cap- 
 tain's complaints, Boreas came foaming loud 
 and strong. The little craft was quickly 
 trimmed and snugged, her inviting sails spread 
 open, and away she dashed to her ocean home 
 like an exulting war-horse to the battle. Islet 
 after islet speedily grew dim and sank beneath 
 the horizon. Deeper became the blue of the 
 [ i44 1 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 water, and in a few hours all of Florida van- 
 ished. 
 
 This excursion on the sea, the first one after 
 twenty years in the woods, was of course ex- 
 ceedingly interesting, and I was full of hope, 
 glad to be once more on my journey to the 
 South. Boreas increased in power and the Is- 
 land Belle appeared to glory in her speed and 
 managed her full-spread wings as gracefully 
 as a sea-bird. In less than a day our norther 
 increased ■ in strength to the storm point. 
 Deeper and wider became the valleys, and yet 
 higher the hills of the round plain of water. 
 The flying jib and gaff topsails were lowered 
 and mainsails close-reefed, and our deck was 
 white with broken wave-tops. 
 
 "You had better go below," said the captain. 
 "The Gulf Stream, opposed by this wind, is 
 raising a heavy sea and you will be sick. No 
 landsman can stand this long." I replied that 
 I hoped the storm would be as violent as his 
 ship could bear, that I enjoyed the scenery of 
 such a sea so much that it was impossible to be 
 [ i45 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 sick, that I had long waited in the woods for 
 just such a storm, and that, now that the pre- 
 cious thing had come, I would remain on deck 
 and enjoy it. "Well," said he, " if you can stand 
 this, you are the first landsman I ever saw that 
 could." 
 
 I remained on deck, holding on by a rope 
 to keep from being washed overboard, and 
 watched the behavior of the Belle as she dared 
 nobly on ; but my attention was mostly directed 
 among the glorious fields of foam-topped waves. 
 The wind had a mysterious voice and carried 
 nothing now of the songs of birds or of the rus- 
 tling of palms and fragrant vines. Its burden 
 was gathered from a stormy expanse of crested 
 waves and briny tangles. I could see no striving 
 in those magnificent wave-motions, no raging; 
 all the storm was apparently inspired with na- 
 ture's beauty and harmony. Every wave was 
 obedient and harmonious as the smoothest 
 ripple of a forest lake, and after dark all the 
 water was phosphorescent like silver fire, a 
 glorious sight. 
 
 [ 146] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 Our luminous storm was all too short for 
 me. Cuba's rock-waves loomed above the 
 white waters early in the morning. The sailors, 
 accustomed to detect the faintest land line, 
 pointed out well-known guiding harbor-marks 
 back of the Morro Castle long before I could 
 see them through the flying spray. We sailed 
 landward for several hours, the misty shore be- 
 coming gradually more earthlike. A flock of 
 white-plumaged ships was departing from the 
 Havana harbor, or, like us, seeking to enter 
 it. No sooner had our little schooner flapped 
 her sails in the lee of the Castle than she 
 was boarded by a swarm of daintily, dressed 
 officials who were good-naturedly and good- 
 gestiiredly making all sorts of inquiries, while 
 our busy captain, paying little attention to 
 them, was giving orders to his crew. 
 
 The neck of the harbor is narrow and it is 
 seldom possible to sail in to appointed anchor- 
 age without the aid of a steam tug. Our cap- 
 tain wished to save his money, but after much 
 profitless tacking was compelled to take the 
 [ i47l 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile JValk 
 
 proffered aid of steam, when we soon reached 
 our quiet mid-harbor quarters and dropped 
 anchor among ships of every size from every 
 sea. 
 
 I was still four or five hundred yards from 
 land and could determine no plant in sight ex- 
 cepting the long arched leaf banners of the 
 banana and the palm, which made a brave 
 show on the Morro Hill. When we were ap- 
 proaching the land, I observed that in some 
 places it was distinctly yellow, and I wondered 
 while we were yet some miles distant whether 
 the color belonged to the ground or to sheets of 
 flowers. From our harbor home I could now 
 see that the color was plant-gold. On one side 
 of the harbor was a city of these yellow plants ; 
 on the other, a city of yellow stucco houses, 
 narrowly and confusedly congregated. 
 
 "Do you want to go ashore?" said the cap- 
 tain to me. "Yes," I replied, "but I wish to go 
 to the plant side of the harbor." "Oh, well," 
 he said, "come with me now. There are some 
 fine squares and gardens in the city, full of all 
 [ 148 1 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 sorts of trees and flowers. Enjoy these to-day, 
 and some other day we will all go over the 
 Morro Hill with you and gather shells. All 
 kinds of shells are over there ; but these yellow 
 slopes that you see are covered only with 
 weeds.' , 
 
 We jumped into the boat and a couple of 
 sailors pulled us to the thronged, noisy wharf. 
 It was Sunday afternoon, 1 the noisiest day of 
 a Havana week. Cathedral bells and prayers 
 in the forenoon, theaters and bull-fight bells 
 and bellowings in the afternoon! Lowly whis- 
 pered prayers to the saints and the Virgin, fol- 
 lowed by shouts of praise or reproach to bulls 
 and matadors! I made free with fine oranges 
 and bananas and many other fruits. Pineapple 
 I had never seen before. Wandered about the 
 narrow streets, stunned with the babel of 
 strange sounds and sights; went gazing, also, 
 among the gorgeously flowered garden squares, 
 and then waited among some boxed mer- 
 chandise until our captain, detained by busi- 
 
 1 Doubtless January 12, 1868. 
 [ 149 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 ness, arrived. Was glad to escape to our little 
 schooner Belle again, weary and heavy laden 
 with excitement and tempting fruits. 
 
 As night came on, a thousand lights starred 
 the great town. I was now in one of my happy 
 dreamlands, the fairest of West India islands. 
 But how, I wondered, shall I be able to escape 
 from this great city confusion? How shall I 
 reach nature in this delectable land ? Consult- 
 ing my map, I longed to climb the central moun- 
 tain range of the island and trace it through all 
 its forests and valleys and over its summit 
 peaks, a distance of seven or eight hundred 
 miles. But alas ! though out of Florida swamps, 
 fever was yet weighing me down, and a mile of 
 city walking was quite exhausting. The weather 
 too was oppressively warm and sultry. 
 
 January 16. During the few days since our 
 arrival the sun usually has risen unclouded, 
 pouring down pure gold, rich and dense, for 
 one or two hours. Then islandlike masses of 
 white-edged cumuli suddenly appeared, grew 
 to storm size, and in a few minutes discharged 
 [ iSo] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 rain in tepid plashing bucketfuls, accompanied 
 with high wind. This was followed by a short 
 space of calm, half-cloudy sky, delightfully 
 fragrant with flowers, and again the air would 
 become hot, thick, and sultry. 
 
 This weather, as may readily be perceived, 
 was severe to one so weak and feverish, and 
 after a dozen trials of strength over the Morro 
 Hill and along the coast northward for shells 
 and flowers, I was sadly compelled to see that 
 no enthusiasm could enable me to walk to the 
 interior. So I was obliged to limit my re- 
 searches to within ten or twelve miles of 
 Havana. Captain Parsons offered his ship as 
 my headquarters, and my weakness prevented 
 me from spending a single night ashore. 
 
 The daily programme for nearly all the 
 month that I spent here was about as follows: 
 After breakfast a sailor rowed me ashore on the 
 north side of the harbor. A few minutes' walk 
 took me past the Morro Castle and out of sight 
 of the town on a broad cactus common, about 
 as solitary and untrodden as the tangles of 
 [ 151 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 Florida. Here I zigzagged and gathered prizes 
 among unnumbered plants and shells along the 
 shore, stopping to press the plant specimens and 
 to rest in the shade of vine-heaps and bushes 
 until sundown. The happy hours stole away 
 until I had to return to the schooner. Either 
 I was seen by the sailors who usually came for 
 me, or I hired a boat to take me back. Ar- 
 rived, I reached up my press and a big handful 
 of flowers, and with a little help climbed up the 
 side of my floating home. 
 
 Refreshed with supper and rest, I recounted 
 my adventures in the vine tangles, cactus 
 thickets, sunflower swamps, and along the 
 shore among the breakers. My flower speci- 
 mens, also, and pocketfuls of shells and corals 
 had to be reviewed. Next followed a cool, 
 dreamy hour on deck amid the lights of the 
 town and the various vessels coming and de- 
 parting. 
 
 Many strange sounds were heard: the vo- 
 ciferous, unsmotherable bells, the heavy thun- 
 dering of cannon from the Castle, and the 
 [ 152] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 shouts of the sentinels in measured time. Com- 
 bined they made the most incessant sharp- 
 angled mass of noise that I ever was doomed 
 to hear. Nine or ten o'clock found me in a small 
 bunk with the harbor wavelets tinkling outside 
 close to my ear. The hours of sleep were filled 
 with dreams of heavy heat, of fruitless efforts 
 for the disentanglement of vines, or of running 
 from curling breakers back to the Morro, etc. 
 Thus my days and nights went on. 
 I Occasionally I was persuaded by the captain 
 to go ashore in the evening on his side of the 
 harbor, accompanied perhaps by two or three 
 other captains. After landing and telling the 
 sailors when to call for us, we hired a carriage 
 and drove to the upper end of the city, to a fine 
 public square adorned with shady walks and 
 magnificent plants. A brass band in imposing 
 uniform played the characteristic lance-noted 
 martial airs of the Spanish. Evening is the 
 fashionable hour for aristocratic drives about 
 the streets and squares, the only time that is 
 delightfully cool. I never saw elsewhere people 
 [ 153 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 so neatly and becomingly dressed. The proud 
 best-family Cubans may fairly be called beau- 
 tiful, are under- rather than over-sized, with 
 features exquisitely moulded, and set off with 
 silks and broadcloth in excellent taste. Strange 
 that their amusements should be so coarse. 
 Bull-fighting, brain-splitting bell-ringing, and 
 the most piercing artificial music appeal to 
 their taste. 
 
 The rank and wealth of Havana nobility, 
 when out driving, seems to be indicated by the 
 distance of their horses from the body of the 
 carriage. The higher the rank, the longer the 
 shafts of the carriage, and the clumsier and 
 more ponderous are the wheels, which are 
 not unlike those of a cannon-cart. A few of 
 these carriages have shafts twenty-five feet in 
 length, and the brilliant-liveried negro driver 
 on the lead horse, twenty or thirty feet in 
 advance of the horse in the shafts, is beyond 
 calling distance of his master. 
 
 Havana abounds in public squares, which in 
 all my random strolls throughout the big town 
 [ iS4 1 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 I found to be well watered, well cared for, well 
 planted, and full of exceedingly showy and in- 
 teresting plants, rare even amid the exhaustless 
 luxuriance of Cuba. These squares also con- 
 tained fine marble statuary and were furnished 
 with seats in the shadiest places. Many of the 
 walks were paved instead of graveled. 
 
 The streets of Havana are crooked, laby- 
 rinthic, and exceedingly narrow. The sidewalks 
 are only about a foot wide. A traveler experi- 
 ences delightful relief when, heated and wearied 
 by raids through the breadth of the dingy yellow 
 town, dodging a way through crowds of men 
 and mules and lumbering carts and carriages, 
 he at length finds shelter in the spacious, dust- 
 less, cool, flowery squares; still more when, 
 emerging from all the din and darkness of these 
 lanelike streets, he suddenly finds himself out 
 in the middle of the harbor, inhaling full- 
 drawn breaths of the sea breezes. 
 
 The interior of the better houses which came 
 under my observation struck me with the pro- 
 fusion of dumpy, ill-proportioned pillars at the 
 [ 155 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 entrances and in the halls, and with the spacious 
 open-fielded appearance of their enclosed square 
 house-gardens or courts. Cubans in general ap- 
 pear to me superfinely polished, polite, and 
 agreeable in society, but in their treatment of 
 animals they are cruel. I saw more downright 
 brutal cruelty to mules and horses during the 
 few weeks I stayed there than in my whole life 
 elsewhere. Live chickens and hogs are tied in 
 bunches by the legs and carried to market thus, 
 slung on a mule. In their general treatment of 
 all sorts of animals they seem to have no 
 thought for them beyond cold-blooded, selfish 
 interest. 
 
 In tropical regions it is easy to build towns, 
 but it is difficult to subdue their armed and 
 united plant inhabitants, and to clear fields 
 and make them blossom with breadstuff. The 
 plant people of temperate regions, feeble, un- 
 armed, unallied, disappear under the trampling 
 feet of flocks, herds, and man, leaving their 
 homes to enslavable plants which follow the 
 will of man and furnish him with food. But the 
 1 156] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 armed and united plants of the tropics hold their 
 rightful kingdom plantfully, nor, since the first 
 appearance of Lord Man, have they ever suf- 
 fered defeat. 
 
 A large number of Cuba's wild plants circle 
 closely about Havana. In five minutes' walk 
 from the wharf I could reach the undisturbed 
 settlements of Nature. The field of the greater 
 portion of my rambling researches was a strip 
 of rocky common, silent and unfrequented by 
 anybody save an occasional beggar at Nature's 
 door asking a few roots and seeds. This natu- 
 ral strip extended ten miles along the coast 
 northward, with but few large-sized trees and 
 bushes, but rich in magnificent vines, cacti- 
 composites, leguminous plants, grasses, etc. 
 The wild flowers of this seaside field are a 
 happy band, closely joined in splendid array. 
 The trees shine with blossoms and with light 
 reflected from the leaves. The individuality 
 of the vines is lost in trackless, interlacing, 
 twisting, overheaping union. 
 
 Our American "South" is rich in flowery 
 [ i57] 
 
A "Thousand' Mile JValk 
 
 vines. In some districts almost every tree is 
 crowned with them, aiding each other in grace 
 and beauty. Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennes- 
 see have the grapevine in predominant num- 
 bers and development. Farther south dwell the 
 greenbriers and countless leguminous vines. 
 A vine common among the Florida islets, per- 
 haps belonging to the dogbane family, over- 
 runs live-oaks and palmettos, with frequently 
 more than a hundred stems twisted into one 
 cable. Yet in no section of the South are there 
 such complicated and such gorgeously flowered 
 vine-tangles as flourish in armed safety in the 
 hot and humid wild gardens of Cuba. 
 
 The longest and the shortest vine that I 
 found in Cuba were both leguminous. I have 
 said that the harbor side of the Morro Hill is 
 clothed with tall yellow-flowered composites 
 through which it is difficult to pass. But there 
 are smooth, velvety, lawnlike patches in these 
 Composite forests. Coming suddenly upon one 
 of these open places, I stopped to admire its 
 greenness and smoothness, when I observed a 
 [ iS8] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 sprinkling of large papilionaceous blossoms 
 among the short green grass. The long com- 
 posites that bordered this little lawn were en- 
 twined and almost smothered with vines which 
 bore similar corollas in tropic abundance. 
 
 I at once decided that these sprinkled flow- 
 ers had been blown off the encompassing 
 tangles and had been kept fresh by dew and by 
 spray from the sea. But, on stooping to pick 
 one of them up, I was surprised to find that it 
 was attached to Mother Earth by a short, pros- 
 trate, slender hair of a vine stem, bearing, be- 
 sides the one large blossom, a pair or two of 
 linear leaves. The flower weighed more than 
 stem, root, and leaves combined. Thus, in a 
 land of creeping and twining giants, we find 
 also this charming, diminutive simplicity — 
 the vine reduced to its lowest terms. 
 
 The longest vine, prostrate and untwined like 
 its little neighbor, covers patches of several hun- 
 dred square yards with its countless branches 
 and close growth of upright, trifoliate, smooth 
 green leaves. The flowers are as plain and un- 
 [ i59 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 showy in size and color as those of the sweet 
 peas of gardens. The seeds are large and satiny. 
 The whole plant is noble in its motions and 
 features, covering the ground with a depth of 
 unconfused leafage which I have never seen 
 equaled by any other plant. The extent of leaf- 
 surface is greater, I think, than that of a large 
 Kentucky oak. It grows, as far as my obser- 
 vation has reached, only upon shores, in a soil 
 composed of broken shells and corals, and ex- 
 tends exactly to the water-line of the highest- 
 reaching waves. The same plant is abundant 
 in Florida. 
 
 The cacti form an important part of the plant 
 population of my ramble ground. They are 
 various as the vines, consisting now of a dimin- 
 utive joint or two hid in the weeds, now rising 
 into bushy trees, wide-topped, with trunks a 
 foot in diameter, and with glossy, dark-green 
 joints that reflect light like the s ilex- varnished 
 palms. They are planted for fences, together 
 with the Spanish bayonet and agave. 
 
 In one of my first walks I was laboriously 
 [ 160] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 scrambling among some low rocks gathering 
 ferns and vines, when I was startled by finding 
 my face close to a great snake, whose body was 
 disposed carelessly like a castaway rope among 
 the weeds and stones. After escaping and com- 
 ing to my senses, I discovered that the snake 
 was a member of the vegetable kingdom, ca- 
 pable of no dangerous amount of locomotion, 
 but possessed of many a fang, and prostrate 
 as though under the curse of Eden, "Upon thy 
 belly shalt thou go and dust shalt thou eat." 
 
 One day, after luxuriating in the riches of 
 my Morro pasture, and pressing many new 
 specimens, I went down to the bank of brilliant 
 wave-washed shells to rest awhile in their 
 beauty, and to watch the breakers that a power- 
 ful norther was heaving in splendid rank along 
 the coral boundary. I gathered pocketfuls of 
 shells, mostly small but fine in color and form, 
 and bits of rosy coral. Then I amused myself 
 by noting the varying colors of the waves and 
 the different forms of their curved and blossom- 
 ing crests. While thus alone and free it was 
 [ 161 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile JValk 
 
 interesting to learn the richly varied songs, 
 or what we mortals call the roar, of expiring 
 breakers. I compared their variation with the 
 different distances to which the broken wave- 
 water reached landward in its farthest-flung 
 foam-wreaths, and endeavored to form some 
 idea of the one great song sounding forever all 
 around the white-blooming shores of the world. 
 Rising from my shell seat, I watched a wave 
 leaping from the deep and coming far up the 
 beveled strand to bloom and die in a mass of 
 white. Then I followed the spent waters in 
 their return to the blue deep, wading in their 
 spangled, decaying fragments until chased back 
 up the bank by the coming of another wave. 
 While thus playing half studiously, I discovered 
 in the rough, beaten deathbed of the wave a 
 little plant with closed flowers. It was crouch- 
 ing in a hollow of the brown wave-washed rock, 
 and one by one the chanting, dying waves 
 rolled over it. The tips of its delicate pink 
 petals peered above the clasping green calyx. 
 " Surely," said I, as I stooped over it for a mo- 
 [ 162 1 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 ment, before the, oncoming of another wave, 
 "surely you cannot be living here! You must 
 have been blown from some warm bank, and 
 rolled into this little hollow crack like a dead 
 shell. ,, But, running back after every retiring 
 wave, I found that its roots were wedged into 
 a shallow wrinkle of the coral rock, and that 
 this wave-beaten chink was indeed its dwelling- 
 place. 
 
 I had oftentimes admired the adaptation dis- 
 played in the structure of the stately dulse and 
 other seaweeds, but never thought to find a 
 highbred flowering plant dwelling amid waves 
 in the stormy, roaring domain of the sea. This 
 little plant has smooth globular leaves, fleshy 
 and translucent like beads, but green like those 
 of other land plants. The flower is about five 
 eighths of an inch in diameter, rose-purple, 
 opening in calm weather, when deserted by the 
 waves. In general appearance it is like a small 
 portulaca. The strand, as far as I walked it, 
 was luxuriantly fringed with woody Compositcz y 
 two or three feet in height, their tops purple 
 [ 163 ] 
 
A thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 and golden with a profusion of flowers. Among 
 these I discovered a small bush whose yellow 
 flowers were ideal; all the parts were present 
 regularly alternate and in fives, and all sepa- 
 rate, a plain harmony. 
 
 When a page is written over but once it may 
 be easily read; but if it be written over and 
 over with characters of every size and style, it 
 soon becomes unreadable, although not a single 
 confused meaningless mark or thought may oc- 
 cur among all the written characters to mar 
 its perfection. Our limited powers are similarly 
 perplexed and overtaxed in reading the inex- 
 haustible pages of nature, for they are written 
 over and over uncountable times, written in 
 characters of every size and color, sentences 
 composed of sentences, every part of a char- 
 acter a sentence. There is not a fragment in 
 all nature, for every relative fragment of one 
 thing is a full harmonious unit in itself. All 
 together form the one grand palimpsest of 
 the world. 
 
 One of the most common plants of my pas- 
 [ 164 1 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 ture was the agave. It is sometimes used for 
 fencing. One day, in looking back from the top 
 of the Morro Hill, as I was returning to the 
 Island Belle, I chanced to observe two poplar- 
 like trees about twenty-five feet in height. 
 They were growing in a dense patch of cactus 
 and vine-knotted sunflowers. I was anxious to 
 see anything so homelike as a poplar, and so 
 made haste towards the two strange trees, mak- 
 ing a way through the cactus and sunflower 
 jungle that protected them. I was surprised to 
 find that what I took to be poplars were agaves 
 in flower, the first I had seen. They were almost 
 out of flower, and fast becoming wilted at the 
 approach of death. Bulbs were scattered about, 
 and a good many still remained on the branches, 
 which gave it a fruited appearance. 
 
 The stem of the agave seems enormous in size 
 when one considers that it is the growth of a 
 few weeks. This plant is said to make a mighty 
 effort to flower and mature its seeds and then to 
 die of exhaustion. Now there is not, so far as 
 I have seen, a mighty effort or the need of one, 
 [ 165] 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 in wild Nature. She accomplishes her ends with- 
 out unquiet effort, and perhaps there is nothing 
 more mighty in the development of the flower- 
 stem of the agave than in the development of a 
 grass panicle. 
 
 Havana has a fine botanical garden. I spent 
 pleasant hours in its magnificent flowery ar- 
 bors and around its shady fountains. There 
 is a palm avenue which is considered wonder- 
 fully stately and beautiful, fifty palms in two 
 straight lines, each rigidly perpendicular. The 
 smooth round shafts, slightly thicker in the 
 middle, appear to be productions of the lathe, 
 rather than vegetable stems. The fifty arched 
 crowns, inimitably balanced, blaze in the sun- 
 shine like heaps of stars that have fallen from 
 the skies. The stems were about sixty or 
 seventy feet in height, the crowns about fifteen 
 feet in diameter. 
 
 Along a stream-bank were tall, waving bam- 
 boos, leafy as willows, and infinitely graceful in 
 w r ind gestures. There was one species of palm, 
 with immense bipinnate leaves and leaflets 
 [ 166] 
 
A Sojourn in Cuba 
 
 fringed, jagged, and one-sided, like those of 
 Adiantum. Hundreds of the most gorgeous- 
 flowered plants, some of them large trees, be- 
 longing to the Leguminosce. Compared with 
 what I have before seen in artificial flower-gar- 
 dens, this is past comparison the grandest. It is 
 a perfect metropolis of the brightest and most 
 exuberant of garden plants, watered by hand- 
 some fountains, while graveled and finely bor- 
 dered walks slant and curve in all directions, 
 and in all kinds of fanciful playground styles, 
 more like the fairy gardens of the Arabian 
 Nights than any ordinary man-made pleasure- 
 ground. 
 
 In Havana I saw the strongest and the ugliest 
 negroes that I have met in my whole walk. The 
 stevedores of the Havana wharf are muscled 
 in true giant style, enabling them to tumble 
 and toss ponderous casks and boxes of sugar 
 weighing hundreds of pounds as if they were 
 empty. I heard our own brawny sailors, after 
 watching them at work a few minutes, ex- 
 press unbounded admiration of their strength, 
 1 167 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 and wish that their hard outbulging muscles 
 were for sale. The countenances of some of 
 the negro orange-selling dames express a de- 
 vout good-natured ugliness that I never could 
 have conceived any arrangement of flesh and 
 blood to be capable of. Besides oranges they 
 sold pineapples, bananas, and lottery tickets. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 BY A CROOKED ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA 
 
 AFTER passing a month in this mag- 
 nificent island, and finding that my 
 health was not improving, I made up 
 my mind to push on to South America while 
 my stock of strength, such as it was, lasted. But 
 fortunately I could not find passage for any 
 South American port. I had long wished to 
 visit the Orinoco basin and in particular the 
 basin of the Amazon. My plan was to get ashore 
 anywhere on the north end of the continent, 
 push on southward through the wilderness 
 around the headwaters of the Orinoco, until I 
 reached a tributary of the Amazon, and float 
 down on a raft or skiff the whole length of the 
 great river to its mouth. It seems strange that 
 such a trip should ever have entered the dreams 
 of any person, however enthusiastic and full of 
 youthful daring, particularly under the disad- 
 vantages of poor health, of funds less than a 
 I 169] 
 
A c Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 hundred dollars, and of the insalubrity of the 
 Amazon Valley. 
 
 Fortunately, as I said, after visiting all the 
 shipping agencies, I could not find a vessel of 
 any sort bound for South America, and so made 
 up a plan to go North, to the longed-for cold 
 weather of New York, and thence to the forests 
 and mountains of California. There, I thought, 
 I shall find health and new plants and moun- 
 tains, and after a year spent in that interesting 
 country I can carry out my Amazon plans. 
 
 It seemed hard to leave Cuba thus unseen 
 and unwalked, but illness forbade my stay and 
 I had to comfort myself with the hope of return- 
 ing to its waiting treasures in full health. In 
 the mean time I prepared for immediate de- 
 parture. When I was resting in one of the Ha- 
 vana gardens, I noticed in a New York paper 
 an advertisement of cheap fares to California. 
 I consulted Captain Parsons concerning a pass- 
 age to New York, where I could find a ship for 
 California. At this time none of the California 
 ships touched at Cuba. 
 
 [ 170 ] 
 
7# California 
 
 "Well," said he, pointing toward the middle 
 of the harbor, "there is a trim little schooner 
 loaded with oranges for New York, and these 
 little fruiters are fast sailers. You had better 
 see her captain about a passage, for she must 
 be about ready to sail." So I jumped into the 
 dinghy and a sailor rowed me over to the fruiter. 
 Going aboard, I inquired for the captain, who 
 soon appeared on deck and readily agreed to 
 carry me to New York for twenty-five dollars. 
 Inquiring when he would sail, "To-morrow 
 morning at daylight," he replied, "if this 
 norther slacks a little ; but my papers are made 
 out, and you will have to see the American 
 consul to get permission to leave on my ship." 
 
 I immediately went to the city, but was un- 
 able to find the consul, whereupon I deter- 
 mined to sail for New York without any formal 
 leave. Early next morning, after leaving the 
 Island Belle and bidding Captain Parsons 
 good-bye, I was rowed to the fruiter and got 
 aboard. Notwithstanding the north wind was 
 still as boisterous as ever, our Dutch captain 
 [ 171 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile TValk 
 
 was resolved to face it, confident in the strength 
 of his all-oak little schooner. 
 
 Vessels leaving the harbor are stopped at the 
 Mono Castle to have their clearance papers 
 examined; in particular, to see that no runa- 
 way slaves were being carried away. The offi- 
 cials came alongside our little ship, but did not 
 come aboard. They were satisfied by a glance 
 at the consul's clearance paper, and with the 
 declaration of the captain, when asked whether 
 
 he had any negroes, that he had "not a d d 
 
 one." "All right, then," shouted the officials, 
 "farewell! A pleasant voyage to you!" As my 
 name was not on the ship's papers, I stayed 
 below, out of sight, until I felt the heaving of 
 the waves and knew that we were fairly out on 
 the open sea. The Castle towers, the hills, the 
 palms, and the wave-white strand, all faded in 
 the distance, and our mimic sea-bird was at 
 home in the open stormy gulf, curtsying to 
 every wave and facing bravely to the wind. 
 
 Two thousand years ago our Saviour told 
 Nicodemus that he did not know where the 
 [ 172 ] 
 
To California 
 
 winds came from, nor where they were going. 
 And now in this Golden Age, though we Gen- 
 tiles know the birthplace of many a wind and 
 also "whither it is going," yet we know about 
 as little of winds in general as those Palestinian 
 Jews, and our ignorance, despite the powers of 
 science, can never be much less profound than 
 it is at present. 
 
 The substance of the winds is too thin for 
 human eyes, their written language is too diffi- 
 cult for human minds, and their spoken lan- 
 guage mostly too faint for the ears. A mechan- 
 ism is said to have been invented whereby the 
 human organs of speech are made to write 
 their own utterances. But without any extra 
 mechanical contrivance, every speaker also 
 writes as he speaks. All things in the creation 
 of God register their own acts. The poet was 
 mistaken when he said, "From the wing no scar 
 the sky sustains." His eyes were simply too 
 dim to see the scar. In sailing past Cuba I 
 could see a fringe of foam along the coast, but 
 could hear no sound of waves, simply because 
 [ i73 1 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 my ears could not hear wave-dashing at that 
 distance. Yet every bit of spray was sounding 
 in my ears. 
 
 The subject brings to mind a few recollec- 
 tions of the winds I heard in my late journey. 
 In my walk from Indiana to the Gulf, earth 
 and sky, plants and people, and all things 
 changeable were constantly changing. Even 
 in Kentucky nature and art have many a 
 characteristic shibboleth. The people differ in 
 language and in customs. Their architecture 
 is generically different from that of their im- 
 mediate neighbors on the north, not only in 
 planters' mansions, but in barns and granaries 
 and the cabins of the" poor. But thousands of 
 familiar flower faces looked from every hill 
 and valley. I noted no difference in the sky, 
 and the winds spoke the same things. I did 
 not feel myself in a strange land. 
 
 In Tennessee my eyes rested upon the first 
 mountain scenery I ever beheld. I was rising 
 higher than ever before ; strange trees were be- 
 ginning to appear; alpine flowers and shrubs 
 [ 174 1 
 
To California 
 
 were meeting me at every step. But these 
 Cumberland Mountains were timbered with 
 oak, and were not unlike Wisconsin hills piled 
 upon each other, and the strange plants were 
 like those that were not strange. The sky was 
 changed only a little, and the winds not by a 
 single detectible note. Therefore, neither was 
 Tennessee a strange land. 
 
 But soon came changes thick and fast. After 
 passing the mountainous corner of North Car- 
 olina and a little way into Georgia, I beheld 
 from one of the last ridge-summits of the Alle- 
 ghanies that vast, smooth, sandy slope that 
 reaches from the mountains to the sea. It is 
 wooded with dark, branchy pines which were 
 all strangers to me. Here the grasses, which 
 are an earth-covering at the North, grow wide 
 apart in tall clumps and tufts like saplings. 
 My known flower companions were leaving me 
 now, not one by one as in Kentucky and Ten- 
 nessee, but in whole tribes and genera, and com- 
 panies of shining strangers came trooping upon 
 me in countless ranks. The sky, too, was 
 [i75] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 changed, and I could detect strange sounds in 
 the winds. Now I began to feel myself "a 
 stranger in a strange land." 
 
 But in Florida came the greatest change of 
 all, for here grows the palmetto, and here blow 
 the winds so strangely toned by them. These 
 palms and these winds severed the last strands 
 of the cord that united me with home. Now I 
 was a stranger, indeed. I was delighted, aston- 
 ished, confounded, and gazed in wonderment 
 blank and overwhelming as if I had fallen upon 
 another star. But in all of this long, complex 
 series of changes, one of the greatest, and the 
 last of all, was the change I found in the tone 
 and language of the winds. They no longer 
 came with the old home music gathered from 
 open prairies and waving fields of oak, but 
 they passed over many a strange string. The 
 leaves of magnolia, smooth like polished steel, 
 the immense inverted forests of t tillandsia 
 banks, and the princely crowns of palms — 
 upon these the winds made strange music, 
 and at the coming-on of night had overwhelm- 
 1 176 J 
 
"To California 
 
 ing power to present the distance from friends 
 and home, and the completeness of my isola- 
 tion from all things familiar. 
 
 Elsewhere I have already noted that when 
 I was a day's journey from the Gulf, a wind 
 blew upon me from the sea — the first sea 
 breeze that had touched me in twenty years. I 
 was plodding along with my satchel and plants, 
 leaning wearily forward, a little sore from ap- 
 proaching fever, when suddenly I felt the salt 
 air, and before I had time to think, a whole 
 flood of long-dormant associations rolled in 
 upon me. The Firth of Forth, the Bass Rock, 
 Dunbar Castle, and the winds and rocks and 
 hills came upon the wings of that wind, and 
 stood in as clear and sudden light as a land- 
 scape flashed upon the view by a blaze of light- 
 ning in a dark night. 
 
 I like to cling to a small chip of a ship like 
 ours when the sea is rough, and long, comet- 
 tailed streamers are blowing from the curled 
 top of every wave. A big vessel responds awk- 
 wardly with mixed gestures to several waves 
 [ 177 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 at once, lumbering along like a loose floating 
 island. But our little schooner, buoyant as a 
 gull, glides up one side and down the other of 
 each wave hill in delightful rhythm. As we 
 advanced the scenery increased in grandeur 
 and beauty. The waves heaved higher and 
 grew wider, with corresponding motion. It 
 was delightful to ride over this unsullied coun- 
 try of ever-changing water, and when looking 
 upward from the shallow vales, or abroad over 
 the round expanse from the tops of the wave 
 hills, I almost forgot at times that the glassy, 
 treeless country was forbidden to walkers. How 
 delightful it would be to ramble over it on foot, 
 enjoying the transparent crystal ground, and 
 the music of its rising and falling hillocks, un- 
 marred by the ropes and spars of a ship; to 
 study the plants of these waving plains and 
 their stream-currents ; to sleep in wild weather 
 in a bed of phosphorescent wave-foam, or briny 
 scented seaweeds ; to see the fishes by night in 
 pathways of phosphorescent light ; to walk the 
 glassy plain in calm, with birds and flocks of 
 [ 178] 
 
"To California 
 
 glittering flying fishes here and there, or by 
 night with every star pictured in its bosom! 
 
 But even of the land only a small portion is 
 free to man, and if he, among other journeys 
 on forbidden paths, ventures among the ice 
 lands and hot lands, or up in the air in balloon 
 bubbles, or on the ocean in ships, or down into 
 it a little way in smothering diving-bells — in 
 all such small adventures man is admonished 
 and often punished in ways which clearly show 
 him that he is in places for which, to use an 
 approved phrase, he was never designed. How- 
 ever, in view of the rapid advancement of our 
 time, no one can tell how far our star may 
 finally be subdued to man's will. At all events 
 I enjoyed this drifting locomotion to some 
 extent. 
 
 The tar-scented community of a ship is a 
 study in itself — a despotism on the small 
 territory of a few drifting planks pinned to- 
 gether. But as our crew consisted only of four 
 sailors, a mate, and the captain, there were no 
 signs of despotism. We all dined at one table, 
 [ i79 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 enjoying our fine store of salt mackerel and 
 plum duff, with endless abundance of oranges. 
 Not only was the hold of our little ship filled 
 with loose, unboxed oranges, but the deck also 
 was filled up level with the rails, and we had 
 to walk over the top of the golden fruit on 
 boards. 
 
 Flocks of flying fishes often flew across the 
 ship, one or two occasionally falling among 
 the oranges. These the sailors were glad to 
 capture to sell in New York as curiosities, or 
 to give away to friends. But the captain had a 
 large Newfoundland dog who got the largest 
 share of these unfortunate fishes. He used to 
 jump from a dozing sleep as soon as he heard 
 the fluttering of their wings, then pounce and 
 feast leisurely on them before the sailors could 
 reach the spot where they fell. 
 
 In passing through the Straits of Florida the 
 winds died away and the sea was smoothed to 
 unruffled calm. The water here is very trans- 
 parent and of delightfully pure pale-blue color, 
 as different from ordinary dull-colored water 
 [ 180 ] 
 
To California 
 
 as town smoke from mountain air. I could see 
 the bottom as distinctly as one sees the ground 
 when riding over it. It seemed strange that 
 our ship should be upborne in such an ethereal 
 liquid as this, and that we did not run aground 
 where the bottom seemed so near. 
 
 One morning, while among the Bahama dots 
 of islands, we had calm sky and calm sea. The 
 sun had risen in cloudless glory, when I ob- 
 served a large flock of flying fish, a short dis- 
 tance from us, closely pursued by a dolphin. 
 These fish-swallows rose in pretty good order, 
 skimmed swiftly ahead for fifty or a hundred 
 yards in a low arc, then dipped below the sur- 
 face. Dripping and sparkling, they rose again 
 in a few seconds and glanced back into the lucid 
 brine with wonderful speed, but without appar- 
 ent terror. 
 
 At length the dolphin, gaining on the flock, 
 dashed into the midst of them, and now all or- 
 der was at an end. They rose in scattering dis- 
 order, in all directions, like a flock of birds 
 charged by a hawk. The pursuing dolphin also 
 1 181 ] 
 
A 'Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 leaped into the air, showing his splendid colors 
 and wonderful speed. After the first scattering 
 flight all steady pursuit was useless, and the 
 dolphin had but to pounce about in the broken 
 mob of its weary prey until satisfied with his 
 meal. 
 
 We are apt to look out on the great ocean and 
 regard it as but a half-blank part of our globe 
 — a sort of desert, "a waste of water." But, 
 land animals though we be, land is about as 
 unknown to us as the sea, for the turbid 
 glances we gain of the ocean in general through 
 commercial eyes are comparatively worthless. 
 Now that science is making comprehensive 
 surveys of the life of the sea, and the forms of 
 its basins, and similar surveys are being made 
 into the land deserts, hot and cold, we may at 
 length discover that the sea is as full of life as 
 the land. None can tell how far man's knowl- 
 edge may yet reach. 
 
 After passing the Straits and sailing up the 
 coast, when about opposite the south end of the 
 Carolina coast, we had stiff head winds all the 
 [ 182 ] 
 
To California 
 
 way to New York and our able little vessel was 
 drenched all day long. Of course our load of 
 oranges suffered, and since they were boarded 
 over level with the rail, we had difficulty in 
 walking and had many chances of being washed 
 overboard. The flying fishes off Cape Hatteras 
 appeared to take pleasure in shooting across 
 from wave-top to wave-top. They avoided the 
 ship during the day, but frequently fell among 
 the oranges at night. The sailors caught many, 
 but our big Newfoundland dog jumped for them 
 faster than the sailors, and so almost monop- 
 olized the game. 
 
 When dark night fell on the stormy sea, the 
 breaking waves of phosphorescent light were a 
 glorious sight. On such nights I stood on the 
 bowsprit holding on by a rope for hours in order 
 to enjoy this phenomenon. How wonderful 
 this light is ! Developed in the sea by myriads 
 of organized beings, it gloriously illuminates the 
 pathways of the fishes, and every breaking 
 wave, and in some places glows over large areas 
 like sheet lightning. We sailed through large 
 [ ift 1 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 fields of seaweed, of which I procured speci- 
 mens. I thoroughly enjoyed life in this novel 
 little tar-and-oakum home, and, as the end of 
 our voyage drew nigh, I was sorry at the 
 thought of leaving it. 
 
 We were now, on the twelfth day, approach- 
 ing New York, the big ship metropolis. We 
 were in sight of the coast all day. The leafless 
 trees and the snow appeared wonderfully 
 strange. It was now about the end of February 
 and snow covered the ground nearly to the 
 water's edge. Arriving, as we did, in this rough 
 winter weather from the intense heat and gen- 
 eral tropical luxuriance of Cuba, the leafless, 
 snow-white woods of New York struck us with 
 all the novelty and impressiveness of a new 
 world. A frosty blast was sweeping seaward 
 from Sandy Hook. The sailors explored their 
 wardrobes for their long-cast-off woolens, and 
 pulled the ropes and managed the sails while 
 muffled in clothing to the rotundity of Eskimos. 
 For myself, long burdened with fever, the frosty 
 wind, as it sifted through my loosened bones, 
 [ 184 1 
 
"To California 
 
 was more delicious and grateful than ever was 
 a spring-scented breeze. 
 
 We now had plenty of company; fleets of 
 vessels were on the wing from all countries. 
 Our taut little racer outwinded without ex- 
 ception all who, like her, were going to the port. 
 Toward evening we were grinding and wedg- 
 ing our way through the ice-field of the river 
 delta, which we passed with difficulty. Arrived 
 in port at nine o'clock. The ship was deposited, 
 like a cart at market, in a proper slip, and next 
 morning we and our load of oranges, one 
 third rotten, were landed. Thus all the pur- 
 poses of our voyage were accomplished. 
 
 On our arrival the captain, knowing some- 
 thing of the lightness of my purse, told me 
 that I could continue to occupy my bed on 
 the ship until I sailed for California, getting 
 my meals at a near-by restaurant. "This is 
 the way we are all doing/' he said. Consult- 
 ing the newspapers, I found that the first ship, 
 the Nebraska, sailed for Aspinwall in about 
 ten days, and that the steerage passage to 
 [ 185 ] 
 
r 
 
 
 A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 San Francisco by way of the Isthmus was only 
 forty dollars. 
 
 In the mean time I wandered about the city 
 without knowing a single person in it. My walks 
 extended but little beyond sight of my little 
 schooner home. I saw the name Central Park 
 on some of the street-cars and thought I would 
 like to visit it, but, fearing that I might not be 
 able to find my way back, I dared not make the 
 adventure. I felt completely lost in the vast 
 throngs of people, the noise of the streets, and 
 the immense size of the buildings. Often I 
 thought I would like to explore the city if, like 
 a lot of wild hills and valleys, it was clear of 
 inhabitants. 
 
 The day before the sailing of the Panama 
 ship I bought a pocket map of California and 
 allowed myself to be persuaded to buy a dozen 
 large maps, mounted on rollers, with a map of 
 the world on one side and the United States on 
 the other. In vain I said I had no use for them. 
 "But surely you want to make money in Cali- 
 fornia, don't you ? Everything out there is very 
 [ 186] 
 

 To California 
 
 dear. We'll sell you a dozen of these fine maps 
 for two dollars each and you can easily sell them 
 in California for ten dollars apiece." I foolishly 
 allowed myself to be persuaded. The maps 
 made a very large, awkward bundle, but for- 
 tunately it was the only baggage I had except 
 my little plant press and a small bag. I laid 
 them in my berth in the steerage, for they were 
 too large to be stolen and concealed. 
 
 There was a savage contrast between life in 
 the steerage and my fine home on the little ship 
 fruiter. Never before had I seen such a barbar- 
 ous mob, especially at meals. Arrived at Aspin- 
 wall-Colon, we had half a day to ramble about 
 before starting across the Isthmus. Never shall 
 I forget the glorious flora, especially for the 
 first fifteen or twenty miles along the Chagres 
 River. The riotous exuberance of great forest 
 trees, glowing in purple, red, and yellow flow- 
 ers, far surpassed anything I had ever seen, 
 especially of flowering trees, either in Florida 
 or Cuba. I gazed from the car-platform en- 
 chanted. I fairly cried for joy and hoped that 
 [ 187] 
 
A Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 sometime I should be able to return and en- 
 joy and study this most glorious of forests to 
 my heart's content. We reached San Francisco 
 about the first of April, and I remained there 
 only one day, before starting for Yosemite 
 Valley. 1 
 
 I followed the Diablo foothills along the San 
 Jose Valley to Gilroy, thence over the Diablo 
 Mountains to the valley of the San Joaquin 
 by the Pacheco Pass, thence down the valley 
 opposite the mouth of the Merced River, thence 
 across the San Joaquin, and up into the Sierra 
 Nevada to the mammoth trees of Mariposa, 
 and the glorious Yosemite, and thence down the 
 Merced to this place. 2 The goodness of the 
 weather as I journeyed toward Pacheco was be- 
 yond all praise and description — fragrant, mel- 
 low, and bright. The sky was perfectly deli- 
 cious, sweet enough for the breath of angels; 
 every draught of it gave a separate and distinct 
 
 1 At this point the journal ends. The remainder of this 
 chapter is taken from a letter written to Mrs. Ezra S. Carr 
 from the neighborhood of Twenty Hill Hollow in July, 1 868. 
 
 2 Near Snelling, Merced County, California. 
 
 [ 188 ] 
 
To California 
 
 piece of pleasure. I do not believe that Adam 
 and Eve ever tasted better in their balmiest 
 nook. 
 
 The last of the Coast Range foothills were 
 in near view all the way to Gilroy. Their union 
 with the valley is by curves and slopes of inim- 
 itable beauty. They were robed with the green- 
 est grass and richest light I ever beheld, and 
 were colored and shaded with myriads of flow- 
 ers of every hue, chiefly of purple and golden 
 yellow. Hundreds of crystal rills joined song 
 with the larks, filling all the valley with music 
 like a sea, making it Eden from end to end. 
 
 The scenery, too, and all of nature in the 
 Pass is fairly enchanting. Strange and beauti- 
 ful mountain ferns are there, low in the dark 
 canons and high upon the rocky sunlit peaks; 
 banks of blooming shrubs, and sprinklings and 
 gatherings of garment flowers, precious and 
 pure as ever enjoyed the sweets of a mountain 
 home. And oh ! what streams are there ! beam- 
 ing, glancing, each with music of its own, sing- 
 ing as they go, in shadow and light, onward 
 [ 189] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 upon their lovely, changing pathways to the 
 sea. And hills rise over hills, and mountains 
 over mountains, heaving, waving, swelling, in 
 most glorious, overpowering, unreadable maj- 
 esty. 
 
 When at last, stricken and faint like a crushed 
 insect, you hope to escape from all the terrible 
 grandeur of these mountain powers, other foun- 
 tains, other oceans break forth before you ; for 
 there, in clear view, over heaps and rows of 
 foothills, is laid a grand, smooth, outspread 
 plain, watered by a river, and another range 
 of peaky, snow-capped mountains a hundred 
 miles in the distance. That plain is the valley 
 of the San Joaquin, and those mountains are 
 the great Sierra Nevada. The valley of the San 
 Joaquin is the floweriest piece of world I ever 
 walked, one vast, level, even flower-bed, a 
 sheet of flowers, a smooth sea, ruffled a little in 
 the middle by the tree fringing of the river and 
 of smaller cross-streams here and there, from 
 the mountains. 
 
 Florida is indeed a "land of flowers," but 
 [ 190 ] 
 
To California 
 
 for every flower creature that dwells in its most 
 delightsome places more than a hundred are 
 living here. Here, here is Florida! Here they 
 are not sprinkled apart with grass between as 
 on our prairies, but grasses are sprinkled among 
 the flowers ; not as in Cuba, flowers piled upon 
 flowers, heaped and gathered into deep, glow- 
 ing masses, but side by side, flower to flower, 
 petal to petal, touching but not entwined, 
 branches weaving past and past each other, 
 yet free and separate — one smooth garment, 
 mosses next the ground, grasses above, petaled 
 flowers between. 
 
 Before studying the flowers of this valley and 
 their sky, and all of the furniture and sounds 
 and adornments of their home, one can scarce 
 believe that their vast assemblies are perma- 
 nent ; but rather that, actuated by some plant 
 purpose, they had convened from every plain 
 and mountain and meadow of their kingdom, 
 and that the different coloring of patches, acres, 
 and miles marks the bounds of the various 
 tribes and family encampments. 
 
' 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 TWENTY HILL HOLLOW * 
 
 WERE we to cross-cut the Sierra 
 Nevada into blocks a dozen miles 
 or so in thickness, each section 
 would contain a Yosemite Valley and a river, 
 together with a bright array of lakes and mead- 
 ows, rocks and forests. The grandeur and in- 
 exhaustible beauty of each block would be so 
 vast and over-satisfying that to choose among 
 them would be like selecting slices of bread 
 cut from the same loaf. One bread-slice might 
 have burnt spots, answering to craters ; another 
 would be more browned ; another, more crusted 
 or raggedly cut ; but all essentially the same. In 
 no greater degree would the Sierra slices differ 
 in general character. Nevertheless, we all would 
 choose the Merced slice, because, being easier 
 of access, it has been nibbled and tasted, and 
 
 1 This is the hub of the region where Mr. Muir spent the 
 greater part of the summer of 1868 and the spring of 1869. 
 
 [ 192 ] 
 
"Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 pronounced very good; and because of the con- 
 centrated form of its Yosemite, caused by cer- 
 tain conditions of baking, yeasting, and glacier- 
 frosting of this portion of the great Sierra loaf. 
 In like manner, we readily perceive that the 
 great central plain is one batch of bread — 
 one golden cake — and we are loath to leave 
 these magnificent loaves for crumbs, however 
 good. 
 
 \ After our smoky sky has been washed in the 
 rains of winter, the whole complex row of 
 Sierras appears from the plain as a simple 
 wall, slightly beveled, and colored in horizontal 
 bands laid one above another, as if entirely 
 composed of partially straightened rainbows. 
 So, also, the plain seen from the mountains has 
 the same simplicity of smooth surface, colored 
 purple and yellow, like a patchwork of irised 
 clouds. But when we descend to this smooth- 
 furred sheet, we discover complexity in its phys- 
 ical conditions equal to that of the mountains, 
 though less strongly marked. In particular, 
 that portion of the plain lying between the 
 I i93 1 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 Merced and the Tuolumne, within ten miles 
 of the slaty foothills, is most elaborately carved 
 into valleys, hollows, and smooth undulations, 
 and among them is laid the Merced Yosemite 
 of the plain — Twenty Hill Hollow. 
 
 This delightful Hollow is less than a mile in 
 length, and of just sufficient width to form 
 a well-proportioned oval. It is situated about 
 midway between the two rivers, and five miles 
 from the Sierra foothills. Its banks are formed 
 of twenty hemispherical hills ; hence its name. 
 They surround and enclose it on all sides, 
 leaving only one narrow opening toward the 
 southwest for the escape of its waters. The 
 bottom of the Hollow is about two hundred 
 feet below the level of the surrounding plain, 
 and the tops of its hills are slightly below the 
 general level. Here is no towering dome, no 
 Tissiack, to mark its place ; and one may ramble 
 close upon its rim before he is made aware of 
 its existence. Its twenty hills are as wonder- 
 fully regular in size and position as in form. 
 They are like big marbles half buried in the 
 [ i94 1 
 

 
 - 
 
Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 ground, each poised and settled daintily into 
 its place at a regular distance from its fellows, 
 making a charming fairy-land of hills, with 
 small, grassy valleys between, each valley hav- 
 ing a tiny stream of its own, which leaps and 
 sparkles out into the open hollow, uniting to 
 form Hollow Creek. 
 
 Like all others in the immediate neighbor- 
 hood, these twenty hills are composed of strati- 
 fied lavas mixed with mountain drift in vary- 
 ing proportions. Some strata are almost wholly 
 made up of volcanic matter — lava and cinders 
 — thoroughly ground and mixed by the waters 
 that deposited them; others are largely com- 
 posed of slate and quartz boulders of all de- 
 grees of coarseness, forming conglomerates. A 
 few clear, open sections occur, exposing an 
 elaborate history of seas, and glaciers, and vol- 
 canic floods — chapters of cinders and ashes 
 that picture dark, days when these bright 
 snowy mountains were clouded in smoke and 
 rivered and laked with living fire. A fearful 
 age, say mortals, when these Sierras flowed 
 [ i95 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 lava to the sea. What horizons of flame ! What 
 atmospheres of ashes and smoke ! 
 
 The conglomerates and lavas of this region 
 are readily denuded by water. In the time 
 when their parent sea was removed to form 
 this golden plain, their regular surface, in great 
 part covered with shallow lakes, showed little 
 variation from motionless level until torrents 
 of rain and floods from the mountains gradu- 
 ally sculptured the simple page to the present 
 diversity of bank and brae, creating, in the sec- 
 tion between the Merced and the Tuolumne, 
 Twenty Hill Hollow, Lily Hollow, and the 
 lovely valleys of Cascade and Castle Creeks, 
 with many others nameless and unknown, seen 
 only by hunters and shepherds, %unk in the 
 wide bosom of the plain, like undiscovered gold. 
 Twenty Hill Hollow is a fine illustration of a 
 valley created by erosion of water. Here are 
 no Washington columns, no angular El Capi- 
 tans. The hollow canons, cut in soft lavas, are 
 not so deep as to require a single earthquake at 
 the hands of science, much less a baker's dozen 
 [ 196 1 
 
'Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 of those convenient tools demanded for the 
 making of mountain Yosemites, and our mod- 
 erate arithmetical standards are not outraged 
 by a single magnitude of this simple, compre- 
 hensible hollow. 
 
 The present rate of denudation of this portion 
 of the plain seems to be about one tenth of an 
 inch per year. This approximation is based 
 upon observations made upon stream-banks 
 and perennial plants. Rains and winds remove 
 mountains without disturbing their plant or 
 animal inhabitants. Hovering petrels, the fishes 
 and floating plants of ocean, sink and rise in 
 beautiful rhythm with its waves; and, in like 
 manner, the birds and plants of the plain sink 
 and rise with these waves of land, the only dif- 
 ference being that the fluctuations are more 
 rapid in the one case than in the other. 
 
 In March and April the bottom of the Hol- 
 low and every one of its hills are smoothly 
 covered and plushed with yellow and purple 
 flowers, the yellow predominating. They are 
 mostly social Composite, with a few claytonias, 
 [ i97 J 
 
A Thousand- Mile TValk 
 
 giltes, eschscholtzias, white and yellow violets, 
 blue and yellow lilies, dodecatheons, and eri- 
 ogonums set in a half-floating maze of purple 
 grasses. There is but one vine in the Hollow 
 
 — the Megarthiza [Echinocystis T. & D.] or 
 "Big Root." The only bush within a mile of 
 it, about four feet in height, forms so remark- 
 able an object upon the universal smoothness 
 that my dog barks furiously around it, at a 
 cautious distance, as if it were a bear. Some of 
 the hills have rock ribs that are brightly colored 
 with red and yellow lichens, and in moist nooks 
 there are luxuriant mosses — Bartramia, Di- 
 cranum, Funaria, and several Hypnums. In 
 cool, sunless coves the mosses are companioned 
 with ferns — a Cystopteris and the little gold- 
 dusted rock fern, Gymnogramma triangularis. 
 
 The Hollow is not rich in birds. The meadow- 
 lark homes there, and the little burrowing 
 owl, the killdeer, and a species of sparrow. Oc- 
 casionally a few ducks pay a visit to its waters, 
 and a few tall herons — the blue and the white 
 
 — may at times be seen stalking along the 
 
 [ 198 ] 
 
"Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 creek; and the sparrow hawk and gray eagle ' 
 come to hunt. The lark, who does nearly all 
 the singing for the Hollow, is not identical 
 in species with the meadowlark of the East, 
 though closely resembling it ; richer flowers and 
 skies have inspired him with a better song than 
 was ever known to the Atlantic lark. 
 
 I have noted three distinct lark-songs here. 
 The words of the first, which I committed to 
 memory at one of their special meetings, spelled 
 as sung, are, "Wee-ro spee-ro wee-o weer-ly 
 wee-it." On the 20th of January, 1869, they 
 sang "Queed-lix boodle," repeating it with 
 great regularity, for hours together, to music 
 sweet as the sky that gave it. On the 22d of 
 the same month, they sang "Chee chool chee- 
 dildy choodildy." An inspiration is this song of 
 the blessed lark, and universally absorbable by 
 human souls. It seems to be the only bird-song 
 of these hills that has been created with any 
 direct reference to us. Music is one of the at- 
 
 1 Mr. Muir doubtless meant the golden eagle (Aquila 
 chrysaetos). 
 
 I 199 1 
 
A "Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 tributes of matter, into whatever forms it may- 
 be organized. Drops and sprays of air are 
 specialized, and made to plash and churn in the 
 bosom of a lark, as infinitesimal portions of 
 air plash and sing about the angles and hollows 
 of sand-grains, as perfectly composed and pre- 
 destined as the rejoicing anthems of worlds; 
 but our senses are not fine enough to catch 
 the tones. Fancy the waving, pulsing melody 
 of the vast flower-congregations of the Hollow 
 flowing from myriad voices of tuned petal and 
 pistil, and heaps of sculptured pollen. Scarce 
 one note is for us ; nevertheless, God be thanked 
 for this blessed instrument hid beneath the 
 feathers of a lark. 
 
 The eagle does not dwell in the Hollow; he 
 only floats there to hunt the long-eared hare. 
 One day I saw a fine specimen alight upon a 
 hillside. I was at first puzzled to know what 
 power could fetch the sky-king down into the 
 grass with the larks. Watching him attentively, 
 I soon discovered the cause of his earthiness. 
 He was hungry and stood watching a long- 
 [ 200 J 
 
Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 eared hare, which stood erect at the door of his 
 burrow, staring his winged fellow mortal full 
 in the face. They were about ten feet apart. 
 Should the eagle attempt to snatch the hare, 
 he would instantly disappear in the ground. 
 Should long-ears, tired of inaction, venture to 
 skim the hill to some neighboring burrow, the 
 eagle would swoop above him and strike him 
 dead with a blow of his pinions, bear him to 
 some favorite rock table, satisfy his hunger, 
 wipe off all marks of grossness, and go again to 
 the sky. 
 
 Since antelopes have been driven away, the 
 hare is the swiftest animal of the Hollow. 
 When chased by a dog he will not seek a bur- 
 row, as when the eagle wings in sight, but 
 skims wavily from hill to hill across connecting 
 curves, swift and effortless as a bird-shadow. 
 One that I measured was twelve inches in 
 height at the shoulders. His body was eighteen 
 inches, from nose-tip to tail. His great ears 
 measured six and a half inches in length and 
 two in width. His ears — which, notwithstand- 
 [ 201 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 ing their great size, he wears gracefully and be- 
 comingly — have procured for him the homely 
 nickname, by which he is commonly known, of 
 "Jackass rabbit." Hares are very abundant 
 over all the plain and up in the sunny, lightly 
 wooded foothills, but their range does not ex- 
 tend into the close pine forests. 
 
 Coyotes, or California wolves, are occasion- 
 ally seen gliding about the Hollow, but they are 
 not numerous, vast numbers having been slain 
 by the traps and poisons of sheep-raisers. The 
 coyote is about the size of a small shepherd- 
 dog, beautiful and graceful in motion, with 
 erect ears, and a bushy tail, like a fox. Inas- 
 much as he is fond of mutton, he is cordially 
 detested by "sheep-men" and nearly all cul- 
 tured people. 
 
 The ground-squirrel is the most common ani- 
 mal of the Hollow. In several hills there is a 
 soft stratum in which they have tunneled their 
 homes. It is interesting to observe these rodent 
 towns in time of alarm. Their one circular 
 street resounds with sharp, lancing outcries of 
 [ 202 ] 
 
"Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 "Seekit, seek, seek, seekit!" Near neighbors, 
 peeping cautiously half out of doors, engage 
 in low, purring chat. Others, bolt upright on 
 the doorsill or on the rock above, shout excitedly 
 as if calling attention to the motions and as- 
 pects of the enemy. Like the wolf, this little 
 animal is accursed, because of his relish for 
 grain. What a pity that Nature should have 
 made so many small mouths palated like our 
 own! 
 
 All the seasons of the Hollow are warm and 
 bright, and flowers bloom through the whole 
 year. But the grand commencement of the an- 
 nual genesis of plant and insect life is governed 
 by the setting-in of the rains, in December or 
 January. The air, hot and opaque, is then 
 washed and cooled. Plant seeds, which for 
 six months have lain on the ground dry as if 
 garnered in a farmer's bin, at once unfold their 
 treasured life. Flies hum their delicate tunes. 
 Butterflies come from their coffins, like cotyle- 
 dons from their husks. The network of dry 
 water-courses, spread over valleys and hollows, 
 I 203 ] 
 
A c fhousand-Mile Walk 
 
 suddenly gushes with bright waters, sparkling 
 and pouring from pool to pool, like dusty 
 mummies risen from the dead and set living 
 and laughing with color and blood. The weather 
 grows in beauty, like a flower. Its roots in the 
 ground develop day-clusters a week or two in 
 size, divided by and shaded in foliage of clouds ; 
 or round hours of ripe sunshine wave and spray 
 in sky-shadows, like racemes of berries half 
 hidden in leaves. 
 
 These months of so-called rainy season are 
 not filled with rain. Nowhere else in North 
 America, perhaps in the world, are Januarys 
 so balmed and glowed with vital sunlight. Re- 
 ferring to my notes of 1868 and 1869, I find 
 that the first heavy general rain of the season 
 fell on the 18th of December. January yielded 
 to the Hollow, during the day, only twenty 
 hours of rain, which was divided among six 
 rainy days. February had only three days on 
 which rain fell, amounting to eighteen and one- 
 half hours in all. March had five rainy days. 
 April had three, yielding seven hours of rain. 
 [ 204 ] 
 
Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 May also had three wet days, yielding nine 
 hours of rain, and completed the so-called 
 "rainy season" for that year, which is prob- 
 ably about an average one. It must be re- 
 membered that this rain record has nothing to 
 do with what fell in the night. 
 
 The ordinary rainstorm of this region has 
 little of that outward pomp and sublimity of 
 structure so characteristic of the storms of the 
 Mississippi Valley. Nevertheless, we have expe- 
 rienced rainstorms out on these treeless plains, 
 in nights of solid darkness, as impressively 
 sublime as the noblest storms of the mountains. 
 The wind, which in settled weather blows from 
 the northwest, veers to the southeast; the sky 
 curdles gradually and evenly to a grainless, 
 seamless, homogeneous cloud; and then comes 
 the rain, pouring steadily and often driven 
 aslant by strong winds. In 1869, more than 
 three fourths of the winter rains came from 
 the southeast. One magnificent storm from 
 the northwest occurred on the 21st of March; 
 an immense, round-browed cloud came sail- 
 [ 205 ] 
 
A Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 ing over the flowery hills in most imposing 
 majesty, bestowing water as from a sea. The 
 passionate rain-gush lasted only about one min- 
 ute, but was nevertheless the most magnifi- 
 cent cataract of the sky mountains that I ever 
 beheld. A portion of calm sky toward the 
 Sierras was brushed with thin, white cloud- 
 tissue, upon which the rain-torrent showed to 
 a great height — a cloud waterfall, which, like 
 those of Yosemite, was neither spray, rain, nor 
 solid water. In the same year the cloudiness 
 of January, omitting rainy days, averaged 
 0.32; February, 0.13; March, 0.20; April, 0.10; 
 May, 0.08. The greater portion of this cloudi- 
 ness was gathered into a few days, leaving the 
 others blocks of solid, universal sunshine in 
 every chink and pore. 
 
 At the end of January, four plants were in 
 flower: a small white cress, growing in large 
 patches ; a low-set, umbeled plant, with yellow 
 flowers ; an eriogonum, with flowers in leafless 
 spangles; and a small boragewort. Five or six 
 mosses had adjusted their hoods, and were in 
 [ 206] 
 
"Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 the prime of life. In February, squirrels, hares, 
 and flowers were in springtime joy. Bright 
 plant-constellations shone everywhere about 
 the Hollow. Ants were getting ready for work, 
 rubbing and sunning their limbs upon the husk- 
 piles around their doors; fat, pollen-dusted, 
 "burly, dozing humble-bees " were rumbling 
 among the flowers; and spiders were busy 
 mending up old webs, or weaving new ones. 
 Flowers were born every day, and came gush- 
 ing from the ground like gayly dressed children 
 from a church. The bright air became daily 
 more songful with fly-wings, and sweeter with 
 breath of plants. 
 
 In March, plant-life is more than doubled. 
 The little pioneer cress, by this time, goes to 
 seed, wearing daintily embroidered silicles. 
 Several claytonias appear; also, a large white 
 leptosiphon[?], and two nemophilas. A small 
 plantago becomes tall enough to wave and 
 show silky ripples of shade. Toward the end of 
 this month or the beginning of April, plant-life 
 is at its greatest height. Few have any just con- 
 [ 207 ] 
 
» 
 
 A ^Thousand- Mile Walk 
 
 ception of its amazing richness. Count the 
 flowers of any portion of these twenty hills, or 
 of the bottom of the Hollow, among the streams : 
 you will find that there are from one to ten 
 thousand upon every square yard, counting 
 the heads of Composites as single flowers. Yel- 
 low Composite form by far the greater portion 
 of this goldy-way. Well may the sun feed them 
 with his richest light, for these shining sunlets 
 are his very children — rays of his ray, beams 
 of his beam ! One would fancy that these Cali- 
 fornia days receive more gold from the ground 
 than they give to it. The earth has indeed 
 become a sky; and the two cloudless skies, ray- 
 ing toward each other flower-beams and sun- 
 beams, are fused and congolded into one glow- 
 ing heaven. By the end of April most of the 
 Hollow plants have ripened their seeds and 
 died ; but, undecayed, still assist the landscape 
 with color from persistent involucres and co- 
 rolla-like heads of chaffy scales, 
 , In May, only a few deep-set lilies and eriog- 
 onums are left alive. June, July, August, and 
 [ 208 1/ 
 
Twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 September are the season of plant rest, fol- 
 lowed, in October, by a most extraordinary out- 
 gush of plant-life, at the very driest time of the 
 whole year. A small, unobtrusive plant, Hemi- 
 zonia virgata, from six inches to three feet in 
 height, with pale, glandular leaves, suddenly 
 bursts into bloom, in patches miles in extent, 
 like a resurrection of the gold of April. I have 
 counted upward of three thousand heads upon 
 one plant. Both leaves and pedicles are so 
 small as to be nearly invisible among so vast 
 a number of daisy golden-heads that seem to 
 keep their places unsupported, like stars in the 
 sky. The heads are about five eighths. of an 
 inch in diameter; rays and disk-flowers, yellow; 
 stamens, purple. The rays have a rich, furred 
 appearance, like the petals of garden pansies. 
 The prevailing summer wind makes all the 
 heads turn to the southeast. The waxy secre- 
 tion of its leaves and involucres has suggested 
 its grim name of "tarweed," by which it is 
 generally known. In our estimation, it is the 
 most delightful member of the whole Compos- 
 [ 209 ] 
 
A Thousand- Mile JValk 
 
 ite Family of the plain. It remains in flower un- 
 til November, uniting with an eriogonum that 
 continues the floral chain across December to 
 the spring plants of January. Thus, although 
 nearly all of the year's plant-life is crowded into 
 February, March, and April, the flower circle 
 around the Twenty Hill Hollow is never broken. 
 The Hollow may easily be visited by tourists 
 en route for Yosemite, as it is distant only about 
 six miles from Snelling's. It is at all seasons in- 
 teresting to the naturalist; but it has little that 
 would interest the majority of tourists earlier 
 than January or later than April. If you wish to 
 see how much of light, life, and joy can be got 
 into a January, go to this blessed Hollow. If 
 you wish to see a plant-resurrection, — myriads 
 of bright flowers crowding from the ground, 
 like souls to a judgment, — go to Twenty Hills 
 in February. If you are traveling for health, 
 play truant to doctors and friends, fill your 
 pocket with biscuits, and hide in the hills of 
 the Hollow, lave in its waters, tan in its golds, 
 bask in its flower-shine, and your baptisms will 
 [ 210 ] 
 
twenty Hill Hollow 
 
 make you a new creature indeed. Or, choked 
 in the sediments of society, so tired of the 
 world, here will your hard doubts disappear, 
 your carnal incrustations melt off, and your 
 soul breathe deep and free in God's shoreless 
 atmosphere of beauty and love. 
 
 Never shall I forget my baptism in this font. 
 It happened in January, a resurrection day for 
 many a plant and for me. I suddenly found 
 myself on one of its hills ; the Hollow overflowed 
 with light, as a fountain, and only small, sun- 
 less nooks were kept for mosseries and ferneries. 
 Hollow Creek spangled and mazed like a river. 
 The ground steamed with fragrance. Light, 
 of unspeakable richness, was brooding the 
 flowers. Truly, said I, is California the Golden 
 State — in metallic gold, in sun gold, and in 
 plant gold. The sunshine for a whole summer 
 seemed condensed into the chambers of that 
 one glowing day. Every trace of dimness had 
 been washed from the sky; the mountains were 
 dusted and wiped clean with clouds — Pacheco 
 Peak and Mount Diablo, and the waved blue 
 [211 ] 
 
A "Thousand-Mile Walk 
 
 wall between ; the grand Sierra stood along the 
 plain, colored in four horizontal bands: — 
 the lowest, rose purple; the next higher, dark 
 purple ; the next, blue ; and, above all, the white 
 row of summits pointing to the heavens. 
 
 It may be asked, What have mountains fifty 
 or a hundred miles away to do with Twenty 
 Hill Hollow ? To lovers of the wild, these moun- 
 tains are not a hundred miles away. Their 
 spiritual power and the goodness of the sky make 
 them near, as a circle of friends. They rise as 
 a portion of the hilled walls of the Hollow. 
 You cannot feel yourself out of doors; plain, 
 sky, and mountains ray beauty which you feel. 
 You bathe in these spirit-beams, turning round 
 and round, as if warming at a camp-fire. Pres- 
 ently you lose consciousness of your own sepa- 
 rate existence: you blend with the landscape, 
 and become part and parcel of nature. 
 
 THE END 
 
Index 
 

Index 
 
 Agave, 165, 166. 
 
 Agrostis scabra. See Grass, 
 rough hair. 
 
 Alligators, 96-99, 112, 113. 
 
 Animals, assumed to be made 
 for man, 137, 138; man- 
 eating, 138; essential to the 
 cosmos, 139. 
 
 Apricot vine, 56. 
 
 Aspidium acrostic hoides. See 
 Fern, Christmas. 
 
 Asplenium ebeneum. See 
 Spleenwort, ebony. 
 
 Asplenium filix-fcemina, 33. 
 
 Asters, 26, 31, 34, 46, 56. 
 
 Athens, Georgia, 52. 
 
 Augusta, Georgia, 54, 56. 
 
 Azaleas, 26, 31. 
 
 Bahama islands, 181. 
 
 Banana, 63, 64. 
 
 Beale, Mr., 43. 
 
 Bird neighbors, 75, 78. 
 
 Blairsville, Georgia, 43, 44. 
 
 Blue Ridge, 44. 
 
 Bluebirds, 135. 
 
 Bonaventure.burying-ground, 
 66-82; oaks in, 67, 68, 69, 
 73; graves of, 71, 72; Muir 
 camps in, 73-78. 
 
 Brake, common, 33. 
 
 Brant, 135. 
 
 Bread, importance of, 95. 
 Breakers, song of, 162. 
 Brier, sensitive, 18, 19. 
 Briers, cat, 26, 27; in Florida 
 
 swamps, 115, 118, 120. 
 Burkesville, Ky., 14. 
 Butterflies, 68, 69. 
 Butternut tree, 12. 
 
 Cactus, 105, 135, 160. 
 California, crooked route to, 
 
 169-87; arrival in, 188; 
 
 flowers, 189, 190, 191, 197, 
 
 198, 206-10; the Golden 
 
 State, 211. 
 Cameron, Mr., planter, 60- 
 
 63. 
 Cape Hatteras, 183. 
 Carriages, in Havana, 154. 
 Cats, vegetable, 133. 
 Caves, Kentucky, 7, 9, 10. 
 Cedar Keys, 123-42; size of, 
 
 133- 
 
 Chagres River, 187. 
 Chattahoochee River, 47, 48. 
 Clinch River, 30, 31. 
 Coast Range foothills, 189. 
 Composite?, 64, 163, 164, 197, 
 
 208, 209. 
 Cotton, an unhappy looking 
 
 plant, 13; picking, 51. 
 Coyote, 202. 
 
 [215] 
 
Index 
 
 Crane, 89. 
 
 Creator and creation, errone- 
 ous views of, 136-42. 
 
 Crows, 135. 
 
 Cuba, a sojourn in, 147-68; 
 weather of, 150, 151; wild 
 plants, 156, 157; flowery 
 vines, 157, 158. 
 
 Cubans, personal appearance, 
 154; cruel to animals, 156. 
 
 Cumberland Mountains, 16, 
 17-46, 175. _ 
 
 Cumberland River, 14. 
 
 Cypress, 57, 58, 63, 64. 
 
 Cystopteris. See Fern, blad- 
 der. 
 
 Death, our warped ideas of, 
 
 70. 
 Deer hunt, 121, 122. 
 Deer's tongue, 34 n. 
 Dipping snuff, 43. 
 Dirt, peculiar to civilization, 
 
 109, no. 
 Dolphin, in pursuit of flying 
 
 fish, 181, 182. 
 Doves, mourning, 135. 
 
 Eagle, bald, 68, 75. 
 
 Eagle, golden, 199 and n., 
 
 200, 201. 
 Electricity, 63. 
 Elizabethtown, Ky., 5. 
 Emory River, 30. 
 Erosion, by water, 196, 197. 
 
 Farmers, in Kentucky, 6; a 
 credulous one, 19, 20. 
 
 Fern, bladder, 12, 33, 198. 
 
 Fern, Christmas, 33. 
 
 Fern, cinnamon, 18, 26, 91. 
 
 Fern, Dicks onia, 31, 33. 
 
 Fern, flowering, 18, 26. 
 
 Fern, gold-dusted rock, 198. 
 
 Fernandina, Florida, 87. 
 
 Ferns, at mouth of cave, 7. 
 
 Feud, in Tennessee, 40. 
 
 Fever, Muir's illness in Flor- 
 ida, 126-29. 
 
 Fever and ague, 136. 
 
 Fish, flying, 180, 183; pur- 
 sued by dolphin, 181, 182. 
 
 Florida, swamps, 83-122; ar- 
 rival in, 87; coast of, 87, 88; 
 forests, 93, 94, 99, 100; 
 streams, 100, 101; a low 
 country, 103; a strange 
 land, 176; Straits of, 180, 
 181. 
 
 Flowering trees, 108, 187. 
 
 Forests, Kentucky, 1-16; 
 pine, 51; vine clad, 56; 
 Florida, 93, 94, 99, 100. 
 
 Gainesville, Georgia, 47, 105, 
 107. 
 
 Gardenia florida. See Jasmine, 
 cape. 
 
 Gardens, artificial, 11, 167. 
 
 Geese, wild, 135. 
 
 Georgia, river country of, 47- 
 65; oaks in, 67, 68, 69; peo- 
 ple and homes of, 83, 84; a 
 strange land, 175, 176. 
 
 Gerardias, 54. 
 
 Ginseng, 41. 
 
 [216] 
 
Index 
 
 Glasgow Junction, Ky., 12, 
 
 13. 
 
 God, a conceited view of, 136, 
 
 137- ; 
 Gold mines, in Tennessee, 35. 
 Goldenrod, 26, 56, 72, 109. 
 Grapes, 34, 47, 48, 49, 56. 
 Grass, rough hair, 58, 59. 
 Grasses, 53, 54, 56, 102. 
 Grist mills, 35, 36. 
 Guerrillas, 25, 27, 28. 
 Gymno gramma triangularis, 
 
 198. 
 
 Hare, long-eared, 200-202. 
 
 Havana, harbor, 147; Sunday 
 in, 149; evening in, 153; 
 carriages of the nobility, 
 154; public squares, 154, 
 155; streets, 155; houses, 
 J 55> J S6; botanical garden, 
 166, 167; negroes in, 167, 
 168. 
 
 Hawk, sparrow, 199. 
 
 Heath wort, 18. 
 
 Hemlock, 31. 
 
 Hermizonia virgata, 209, 210. 
 
 Herons, 132, 134, 198. 
 
 Hiwassee River, 41, 42, 43. 
 
 Hodgson, Mr., sawmill owner, 
 125; Muir works for, 126; 
 cares for Muir through ill- 
 ness, 129. 
 
 Hollow Creek, 195, 21 1. 
 
 Holly, 43. 
 
 Homo sapiens, unwisdom of, 
 139, 141. 
 
 Horse, ferry, 4. 
 
 Horse Cave, 9, 10. 
 Hospitality, in the South, 12, 
 
 21, 22, 34, 42, 56, 59, 61, 
 
 64, 126. 
 
 Hunting, selfishness of, 122. 
 Hypnum, 12, 31, 198. 
 
 Ilex, 43. 
 
 Indianapolis, Ind., I. 
 Island Belle, schooner, 143- 
 47- 
 
 Jamestown, Tenn., 20. 
 Jasmine, cape, 59. 
 Jeffersonville, Ind., 1. 
 
 Kentucky, 174; oaks, 2, 6, 15, 
 16; streams and wells salty, 
 3, 5; farmers, 6; caves, 7, 9, 
 10, 11; forests, 2, 3, 6, 13; 
 a leafy state, 14. 
 
 Kentucky Knobs, 3. 
 
 Killdeer, 198. 
 
 Kingston, Tenn., 32. 
 
 Lark. See Meadowlark. 
 Laurels, 26, 31. 
 Liatris, 34. 
 Lime Key, 135. 
 Linnasus, 116. 
 Live-oak. See Oak, live. 
 Loggers, Florida, 95. 
 Louisville, Ky., 1. 
 Lycopodium, 99. 
 
 Madisonville, Tenn., 33. 
 Madotheca, 31. 
 Magnolia, 31, 101, 176. 
 
 [ 217 ] 
 
Index 
 
 Magnolia grandiflora, 64; in 
 
 Florida, 90, 91, 108. 
 Mammoth Cave, 10, 1 1. 
 Man-catchers, plant, 27. 
 Maps, 186, 187. 
 Meadowlark, 198; songs of, 
 
 199, 200. 
 Memory, imperishable, 123, 
 
 124, 177. 
 Merced River, 188; valley, 
 
 192. 
 Mexico, Gulf of, 124. 
 Milkworts, 26. 
 Mistletoe, 13. 
 Mockingbird, 134, 135. 
 Montgomery, Tenn., 30. 
 Morro Castle, Havana, 147, 
 
 152, 172. 
 Morro Hill, 148, 149, 151, 158, 
 
 165. 
 Moss, Spanish or long, 57, 64, 
 
 68, 176. 
 Mosses, 12, 31, 198, 206. 
 Mount Yonah, 46. 
 Mountaineers, Southern, 44, 
 
 45- 
 Munford, Mr., pioneer, 7, 8. 
 Munfordville, Ky., 7, 8. 
 Murphy, North Carolina, 42, 
 
 43; 
 
 Music, one of the attributes 
 of matter, 199, 200. 
 
 Nebraska, ship in which Muir 
 sailed for California, 185, 
 186, 187. 
 
 Negroes, 13; woman at ford, 
 3, 4; queer little boy, 4; ox 
 
 driver, 9; teamster, 32; 
 easy-going, 51; polite, 52; 
 superstitious, 59; of Geor- 
 gia, 83; a dangerous one, 
 103, 104; a primitive fam- 
 ily, 105-07; in Havana, 167, 
 168. 
 New York, 184, 185, 186. 
 
 Oak, black, 6, 33. 
 
 Oak, dwarf, 131. 
 
 Oak, live, 67-69, 130, 131. 
 
 Oak, water, 47, 53. 
 
 Oaks, in Kentucky, 2, 6, 15, 
 
 16; in Tennessee, 26. 
 Opuntia, 135. 
 Osmunda cinnamomea. See 
 
 Fern, cinnamon. 
 Osmunda Claytoniana, 18, 
 
 33- 
 Osmunda regalis. See Fern, 
 
 flowering. 
 Owl, burrowing, 198. 
 Owls, 94. 
 
 Palmetto, cabbage, 91-93; a 
 fine grove of, 1 13-18. 
 
 Palmetto, saw, 101. 
 
 Palms, 166, 167. 
 
 Parsons, Captain, of the 
 Island Belle, 144, 145, 148, 
 149, 170, 171. 
 
 Passion flower, 56. 
 
 Pelicans, 134. 
 
 Perkins, Dr., 59. 
 
 Philadelphia, Tenn., 32, 33. 
 
 Phosphorescence at sea, 183. 
 
 Pine barrens, 60, 94, 101. 
 
 [ 218 ] 
 
Index 
 
 Pine, long-leafed, 54, 55, 108, 
 130- 
 
 Pines, 26, ior. 
 
 Pinus Cubensis, 91, 108. 
 
 Pinus palustris, 55, 91. 
 
 Plant, striking power of adap- 
 tation of, 162, 163. 
 
 Plant-gold, 148. 
 
 Plants and minerals, assumed 
 to be made for man, 137, 
 138; sensation in, 140. 
 
 Polygalas, 26. 
 
 Poly-podium hexagonopterum, 
 
 33- 
 
 Pomegranate, 56, 57. 
 Prater, Mr., friend of Muir's, 
 
 48, 49. 
 Pteris aquilina. See Brake, 
 
 common. 
 
 Quail (bob-white), 135. 
 
 Rabbit, jackass, 200-202. 
 
 Rainy season, 204-206. 
 
 Rattlesnakes, 49, 51. 
 
 River, adventure in crossing, 
 50. 
 
 Rivers: Chagres, 187; Chat- 
 tahoochee, 47, 48; Clinch, 
 31; Cumberland, 14; Em- 
 ory, 30; Hiwassee, 41, 42; 
 Merced, 188; Salt, 3; Sa- 
 vannah, 58. 
 
 Robins, 135. 
 
 Rolling Fork, 3. 
 
 Salt River, 3. 
 
 San Francisco, 188. 
 
 San Joaquin valley, 190. 
 Sand dunes, 72. 
 Sandy Hook, 184. 
 Savannah, Georgia, 6$. 
 Savannah River, 58. 
 Scale-mosses (Madotheca), 3 1. 
 Schrankia, sensitive brier, 18, 
 
 19. 
 Scott, Gen. Winfield, 43. 
 Scuppernong grape, 49. 
 Sea, beautiful in storm, 177, 
 
 178, 183; our ignorance of, 
 
 182. 
 Sea-islands, 86. 
 Sheep, predestined purpose 
 
 of, 137. 
 Sherman, Gen. W. T., 61. 
 Ship, enjoyable life on, 177- 
 
 80, 184. 
 Sierra Nevada, 190, 192-94, 
 
 212. 
 Simmons, Captain, 111-14. 
 Solidagoes, 26, 56, 72, 109. 
 Spanish bayonet, 132, 133. 
 Spinning, in mountain cab- 
 ins, 37; among Georgia 
 
 farmers, 84. 
 Spleenwort, ebony, 33. 
 Squirrel, ground, 202, 203. 
 Steerage, 187. 
 Storm at sea, 145-47, 177, 
 
 178, 183. 
 Sunflowers, 3. 
 Sunset, gorgeous, 53, 143. 
 Swamps, Florida, 83-122; 
 
 vine-tangled, 90, 91, ill, 
 
 118, 120; night in, 93"-95> 
 
 no. 
 
 [ 219 1 
 
Index 
 
 Sylvan Shore, steamship, 85, 
 86. 
 
 Table, a peculiar, 59. 
 
 Tarweed, 209. 
 
 Taxodium. See Cypress. 
 
 Tennessee, 15, 174, 175; ferns 
 and vines in, 18, 19, 31, 33; 
 an old farmer, 19, 20; a 
 friendly blacksmith, 22-26; 
 trees and plants, 26, 31, 33; 
 briers, 26, 27; guerrillas, 
 27-29; night with a moun- 
 taineer, 34; gold mining, 
 35; grist mills, 3 5, 3 6; spin- 
 ning and weaving, 37; 
 grandeur of scenery, 38; a 
 feud, 40. 
 
 Thomson, Georgia, 54. 
 
 Thrashers, brown, 135. 
 
 Tillandsia usneoides. See 
 Moss, Spanish. 
 
 Track Gap, Tenn., 39. 
 
 Twenty Hill Hollow, 194- 
 212; described, 194; created 
 by erosion of water, 196; 
 flowers in, 197, 198, 206- 
 10; birds, 198-201; ani- 
 
 mals, 201-03 ; seasons, 203- 
 - 10. 
 
 Unaka Mountains, 31, 33. 
 
 Vanilla plant, 34 n. 
 
 Vegetable cats, 133. 
 
 Vines, grape, 34, 47, 48, 49, 
 56; in Florida swamps, 90, 
 91, in, 118, 120, 158; in 
 Cuba, 157-61; in Twenty 
 Hill Hollow, 198. 
 
 Vitis rotundifolia, 49. 
 
 Vohn, John, 36. 
 
 Waders, 131, 132. 
 
 Wagon, a remarkable, 45. 
 
 War, marks of, 84. 
 
 Weaving, in mountain cab- 
 ins, 37; among Georgia 
 farmers, 84. 
 
 Whales, storehouses of oil for 
 man, 137. 
 
 Winds, language of, 173-76. 
 
 Wood, Alphonso, Botany, 18, 
 24, 34 n., 49 n. 
 
 Yucca, 132. 
 

 
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