ved magnolias with one
great creamy flower. "Right pretty" it was, too, in the old woman's
meaning of the word, for Barney drew us through in safety, scarce up to
his knees in the transparent water which reflected so perfectly every
flower and leaf of the dense water-growth. The road beyond was cut
through an arch of close-meeting trees, and farther on it skirted a
broad lake, which already, in its slow, sure, upward progress, had
covered the roadway and was reaching even to the fence which bounds the
field above. In this field is a large mound, never investigated,
although the farmer who owns the property says he has no doubt that it
is the site of an Indian village, for the plough turns up in the fields
around not only arrow-heads, but fragments of pottery and household
utensils. It was not our good-fortune to obtain any of those relics, as
they have not been preserved, and this was the only mound of any extent
which we saw. Such mounds are said, however, to be not infrequent in
this district, and Indian relics are found everywhere.

As we drove along the hillside we began to notice frequent basin-like
depressions of greater or less size, always perfectly circular, always
with the same saucer-shaped dip, always without crack or fissure, yet
appearing to have been formed by a gradual receding of the
substructure, reminding one of the depression in the sand of an
hour-glass or of the grain in a hopper. Many of these concaves were
dry; others had a little water in the bottom; all of them had trees
growing here and there, quite undisturbed, whether in the water or not;
and there was no one who had cared to note how long a time had elapsed
since they had begun their "decline and fall." There is little doubt,
however, that the future traveller will find them developed into lakes,
as, indeed, we found one here and there upon the hilltops.

[Illustration: "THE ONLY GIRL IN THE PLACE."]

How many times we got lost among the lakes and "pot-holes," the fallen
trees and thickets of Ekoniah Scrub, it would be tedious to relate. How
many times we came down to the prairie-level, and, fearful to trust
ourselves upon the treacherous, billowy green, were forced to "try
back" for a new road along the hillside, it would be difficult to say.
The county clerk's itinerary had ended here, and William Townsend
proved to be less ubiquitous than we had been led to expect. Thus it
was that night came down upon us one evening before we had reac