and added a new ornament to the woods, being little
inferior to the flowers of the honey-suckle and hedysarum. They sit in a
circle round the stem's extremity, and have either a dark red or lively
red color; but by standing some time, the sun bleaches them, and at last
they get a whitish hue. The height of the bush is not always alike. Some
were as tall as a full-grown man, and taller; others were but low, and
some were not above a palm from the ground; yet they were all full of
flowers. They have some smell, but I can not say it is very pleasant.
However, the beauty of the color entitles them to a place in every
flower garden.'"--_Travels in North America_, by Professor Kalm, in
Pinkerton, vol. xiii., p. 557.]

[Footnote 168: Seven hours' journey above the sources of the Bow River,
Sir George Simpson mentions meeting with "an unexpected reminiscence of
my own native hills, in the shape of a plant which appeared to me to be
the very heather of the mountains of Scotland; and I might well regard
the reminiscence as unexpected, inasmuch as in all my wanderings, of
more than twenty years, I had never found any thing of the kind in North
America. As I took a considerable degree of interest in the question of
the supposed identity, I carried away two specimens, which, however,
proved, on a minute comparison, to differ from the genuine staple of the
brown heaths of the 'Land o' Cakes.'"--Vol. i., p. 120.

"We missed, also, the small 'crimson-tipped daisy' on the green lawns,
and were told that they have been often cultivated with care, but are
found to wither when exposed to the dry air and bright sun of this
climate. When weeds so common with us can not be reared here, we cease
to wonder at the dissimilarity of the native Flora of the New World.
Yet, wherever the aboriginal forests are cleared, we see orchards,
gardens, and arable lands filled with the same fruit-trees, the same
grain and vegetables, as in Europe, so bountifully has Nature provided
that the plants most useful to man should be capable, like himself, of
becoming cosmopolites."--Lyell's _Travels in North America_, vol. i., p.
5.]

[Footnote 169: The Kalmias were so named by Linnaeus in honor of
Professor Kalm, a favorite pupil of the great botanist.]

[Footnote 170: See Appendix, No. XXVII. (see Vol II)]

[Footnote 171: The oak from the dense forests of Canada, into which the
sun's rays never penetrate, is more porous, more abundant in sap, and
more prone t