first to appear in the
spring, covering the cold gray-black ground with cheery blossoms.
Before the axe or plough had touched the "oak openings" of Wisconsin,
they were swept by running fires almost every autumn after the grass
became dry. If from any cause, such as early snowstorms or late rains,
they happened to escape the autumn fire besom, they were likely to be
burned in the spring after the snow melted. But whether burned in the
spring or fall, ashes and bits of charred twigs and grass stems made
the whole country look dismal. Then, before a single grass-blade had
sprouted, a hopeful multitude of large hairy, silky buds about as
thick as one's thumb came to light, pushing up through the black and
gray ashes and cinders, and before these buds were fairly free from
the ground they opened wide and displayed purple blossoms about two
inches in diameter, giving beauty for ashes in glorious abundance.
Instead of remaining in the ground waiting for warm weather and
companions, this admirable plant seemed to be in haste to rise and
cheer the desolate landscape. Then at its leisure, after other plants
had come to its help, it spread its leaves and grew up to a height of
about two or three feet. The spreading leaves formed a whorl on the
ground, and another about the middle of the stem as an involucre, and
on the top of the stem the silky, hairy long-tailed seeds formed a
head like a second flower. A little church was established among the
earlier settlers and the meetings at first were held in our house.
After working hard all the week it was difficult for boys to sit still
through long sermons without falling asleep, especially in warm
weather. In this drowsy trouble the charming anemone came to our help.
A pocketful of the pungent seeds industriously nibbled while the
discourses were at their dullest kept us awake and filled our minds
with flowers.

The next great flower wonders on which we lavished admiration, not
only for beauty of color and size, but for their curious shapes, were
the cypripediums, called "lady's-slippers" or "Indian moccasins." They
were so different from the familiar flowers of old Scotland. Several
species grew in our meadow and on shady hillsides,--yellow,
rose-colored, and some nearly white, an inch or more in diameter, and
shaped exactly like Indian moccasins. They caught the eye of all the
European settlers and made them gaze and wonder like children. And so
did calopogon, pogonia, spiranthes,