He did not call the yellow spatterdock Nuphar advena, but he knew
its large leaves of rich green, where the black bass or pickerel
sheltered themselves from the summer sun, and its yellow balls on
stout stems, around which his line so often twined and twisted, or
in which the hook caught, not to be jerked out till the long,
green, juicy stalk itself, topped with globe of greenish gold, came
up from its wet bed. He knew the sedges along the bank with their
nodding tassels and stiff lance-like leaves, the feathery grasses,
the velvet moss upon the wet stones, the sea-green lichen on
boulder or tree-trunk. There, in that corner of Echo Lake, grew
the thickest patch of pipewort, with its small, round,
grayish-white, mushroom-shaped tops on long, slender stems. If he
had styled it Eriocaulon septangulare, would it have shown a closer
knowledge of its habits than did his careful avoidance of its
vicinity, his keeping line and flies at a safe distance, as he
muttered to himself, "Them pesky butt'ns agin!" He knew by sight
the bur-reed of mountain ponds, with its round, prickly balls
strung like big beads on the stiff, erect stalks; the little
water-lobelia, with tiny purple blossoms, springing from the waters
of lake and pond. He knew, too, all the strange, beautiful
under-water growth: bladderwort in long, feathery garlands,
pellucid water-weed, quillwort in stiff little bunches with
sharp-pointed leaves of olive-green,--all so seldom seen save by
the angler whose hooks draw up from time to time the wet, lovely
tangle. I remember the amusement with which a certain well-known
botanist, who had journeyed to the mountains in search of a little
plant, found many years ago near Echo Lake, but not since seen,
heard me propose to consult Fishin' Jimmy on the subject. But I
was wiser than he knew. Jimmy looked at the specimen brought as an
aid to identification. It was dry and flattened, and as unlike a
living, growing plant as are generally the specimens from an
herbarium. But it showed the awl-shaped leaves, and thread-like
stalk with its tiny round seed-vessels, like those of our common
shepherd's-purse, and Jimmy knew it at once. "There's a dreffle
lot o' that peppergrass out in deep water there, jest where I
ketched the big pick'ril," he said quietly. "I seen it nigh a foot
high, an' it 's juicier and livin'er than them dead sticks in your
book." At our request he accompanied the unbelieving botanist and
mysel