ked. "I dunno, sir." "Isn't it papaw?" "No, sir, that ain't papaw;"
and then, as if he had just remembered something, he added, "That's dog
banana."

Oftener than anywhere else I resorted to the shore of the lake,--to the
one small part of it, that is to say, which was at the same time easily
reached and comparatively unfrequented. There--going one day farther
than usual--I found myself in the borderland of a cypress swamp. On one
side was the lake, but between me and it were cypress-trees; and on the
other side was the swamp itself, a dense wood growing in stagnant black
water covered here and there with duckweed or some similar growth: a
frightful place it seemed, the very abode of snakes and everything evil.
Stories of slaves hiding in cypress swamps came into my mind. It must
have been cruel treatment that drove them to it! Buzzards flew about my
head, and looked at me. "He has come here to die," I imagined them
saying among themselves. "No one comes here for anything else. Wait a
little, and we will pick his bones." They perched near by, and, not to
lose time, employed the interval in drying their wings, for the night
had been showery. Once in a while one of them shifted his perch with an
ominous rustle. They were waiting for me, and were becoming impatient.
"He is long about it," one said to another; and I did not wonder. The
place seemed one from which none who entered it could ever go out; and
there was no going farther in without plunging into that horrible mire.
I stood still, and looked and listened. Some strange noise, "bird or
devil," came from the depths of the wood. A flock of grackles settled in
a tall cypress, and for a time made the place loud. How still it was
after they were gone! I could hardly withdraw my gaze from the green
water full of slimy black roots and branches, any one of which might
suddenly lift its head and open its deadly white mouth! Once a fish-hawk
fell to screaming farther down the lake. I had seen him the day before,
standing on the rim of his huge nest in the top of a tree, and uttering
the same cries. All about me gigantic cypresses, every one swollen
enormously at the base, rose straight and branchless into the air. Dead
trees, one might have said,--light-colored, apparently with no bark to
cover them; but if I glanced up, I saw that each bore at the top a
scanty head of branches just now putting forth fresh green leaves, while
long funereal streamers of dark Spanish moss hung t