ear oes ease Sp rses3s C F: 4 pUatre Te. Srgtes ite Sado tee es ss . i Mes = as am! iy) AY unhes e BETTY SPRING ROAD. Favorite Drives Hround$ Gardner BY CHAREES DBD: BGOKKAGE [LLUSTRATED FROM ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPHS. FROM PAPERS READ BEFORE THE MONDAY CLUB AND GARDNER INSTITUTE. Press OF THE GARDNER News Company, Copyright, 1896, By Charles D. oe awe e . Sr setinge al Cet ee SONG BG) NS om © % 10. Talne 12. 13% Wile 15. 16. 7 18. 19. 20. De 22. Dr 24. 25. 26. 27h 28. 29. 30. Bit 0) List of Wllustrations. Page. Betty Spring Road, Frontispiece. Initial—Sedge, (Drawing ) I Betty Spring Road, 2 Tomb of Rev. Jonathan @srood: 2 Crystal Lake, zB Betty’s Spring, . c ; 4 Moneses, Pyrola and Pip- sissewa, 5 Buckbean, 5 Pale Laurel, 6 Labrador Tea, 7 Oldest Cellar-hole, 8 Bed of Indian Pipe, 9 Worthington Park, 10 Azalea, II Columbine, 12 Pogonia, 13 Calopogon, 13 Home of the Anes 14 Moccasin Flower, . : . 15 Wild Calla, 16 Andalusite Crystals, 16 Chapel Place, : 17 Purple-fringed Orchis, 18 The Woods near Crystal Lake, (Drawing), 20 Pitcher Plant, 21 Great Green Orchis, 21 Ragged-fringed Orchis, 21 Meadow Lily, 22 Snowy Owl, 23 Old Stump Corawine)S. 24 The Kneeland Place, 25 The Bed of the Brook, (The Cardinal Flower), 26 Page. 33. Near the Kneeland Place, 27 34. Rhodora, : 28 35. Bickford-Travers Mill- adie 29 36. Jackson House, 30 37. Twin Flower, 31 38. In the Woods by Cry sta Dake, (Drawing), 5 Be 39-40 The Old Railroad Cee. 33 41. The Coolidge Place, . 34 42. Redemption Rock, 35 43. Redemption Rock—the Inscription, . 36 44. Crystal Lake, (The eieen pen 5 OG) 45. Crystal Lake, (The ees Cove), : : 38 46. Fringed Gentians, . 39 47. Closed Gentians, 4o 48. An Orchis, 4o 49. Cardinal Flower, 4o 50. The Coolidge Place, . 4I 51. Many-flowered Indian Pipe, 41 52. Skull, (Drawing), . 42 53. The Whispering Pines, A3 54. Bailey Brook, 44 55. Lake Denison, 45 56. Blueberry Blossoms, 46 57. Beryl Mine, 47 58. Lake Denison, 48 59. Ladies’ Tresses, 49 60. White-fringed Orchis, 50 61. Tomahawk, (Tail-piece), . 51 62. Map of Roads of Gardner, 63. Map of Early Settlers, TaN —* enastrao, ysaa to 7. =i) a ae NEL: ls Wosey aS a NS DINMNIANODSI'S BeOw = LSr> TIO 10 44IQ WO Bene MIN "© PNIINWLS WILE IMO THNIDIVI = @ (4M IV wry ance) 2798 BeIITD = FY y iil csp s¥aTsssS AT¥V 3H | yard STP wey. £] Yeon NVH AWAD =° Am — vet ws FE, : 2 ny >——. a NSN SY (272890 “479% WORK oor — 2 Rane f? auT” tts Waid kT ; Favorite Drives Hround Gardner. ‘‘T have learned To look on nature, not as in the hour . Of thoughtless youth.” — Wordsworth. ) everlasting out of nature.’ — Thomas Starr King. SV UR hill-town of Gardner, situated on the highest \ part of the backbone of the state, on the crest of the ridge between Wachusett and Monad- nock, is 1200 feet above the sea, and in sum- mer all the breezes of New England fan her brow. ‘The waters flow away in every direc- tion; to the west by Otter River, to the north by Miller’s River, to the east by the Nashua, and to the south by a branch of the Ware River. The roof-tree of more than one house in Gardner divides the rain drops as they fall, to send part to the Connecticut and the Sound, and part to the ocean above Cape Ann. No wonder she can boast the best record in the Commonwealth for the smallest percentage of deaths from con- sumption. Built on the tops of her seven hills, whichever way we go is ‘‘down-hill.’’ Winchendon lies 200 feet below to the north and 400 feet to the west; Templeton from 400 feet below at Baldwinville to only 2 100 feet at the Centre, on the brow of Dolbier hill; Hubbardston and Westminster, 200 feet below, and Ashburnham on the east, where the “The birds sing in the branches.” famous in New England. villages are, 200 feet below, while Fitch- burg, twelve miles away, lies 700 feet below. Gardner has many pleasant drives through the woods within and beyond her borders, and the stranger may safely take any road, confident that he will find beauties on every side; dark woods inviting him to their cool recesses ; silvery streams reflect- ing the enchantments of the sylvan shades on their banks; flowers in profusion on either hand, in all the colors of the rain- bow; and from every hill-top views rivall- ing in magnificence the choicest and most For not even from famous Round Hill, in Northampton, looking down upon the wide Connecticut meadows, with the ribbon of the river winding through them, nor from the Berk- shire Hills around the Lenox bowl, nor from the Blue Hills of Milton, half lost in soft haze from the ocean, are there afforded such glorious and extensive views of hills, woods, lakes and mountains—the peculiar charm of the New England landscape—as those from our own Gard- ner hills. ‘ach drive has its special charm, however ; ticular view, another because the haunt of a rare wild flower that grows nowhere else, and others because of the stories of the deserted ‘‘ cellar- holes’’ by the way, marking the sites of ancient homesteads. The drives around Gardner are beautiful because they are through a country still left to nature, where the brush by the roadside screens the fields, and the woods have not seen the woodman’s axe fora generation. Every year sees some great tract of woodland despoiled of its royal crown, but every year also sees old sprout lots become full-grown woods, that hide the heavens from us as we eagerly seek their depths. Even before the trees grow large enough to choke to death the berry bushes they invited one because of a par- Tomb of Rev. Jonathan Osgood, The First Settled Minister. in their struggling youth, we rejoice with them in their coming glory. CRYSTAL LAKE. BETTY’S SPRING. 5 The Betty Spring Road. When ‘“The south wind wanders from field to forest, And softly whispers, ‘ The Spring is here,”’ we first of all turn our horse’s head eastward, passing from the busy town streets at once into the shade of the overhanging and ‘‘ venerable woods’’ at Betty’s Spring, the choicest spot in Gardner, where the _ birds sing in the branches, and, at fevening, the plaintive cry of the | whip-poor-will echoes the shrill call fof the quail. In the early part of ithe present century, two Indians, Moneses. Pyrola. Pipsissewa. Betty and her husband Jonas, last of their tribe, lived on the side-hill above the spring since called by her name, in the cottage built by one of the early settlers, John Miles. Only the cellar now remains. Before this they lived a few rods beyond the railroad crossing on the right, on the Beech Hill road, where faint traces of the cellar may still be Buckbean. found in the woods. Afterwards, with a nephew named Jodorus, they moved to the Temple place on Green street, and died there. In the shadow of the woods by Betty’s Spring, beneath the great trees, ‘Huge trunks and each particular trunk a growth Of intertwisted fibres serpentine Upceurling and inveterately convolved,”’ 6 benjamins ( 777//ium erectum ) abound, and the painted trillium ( 77z/- lium erythrocarpum ) with its white face. Here we find the mayflower (Epigwa repens) nestling in its bed of snow, and Jack-in-the-pulpit ( Arisea triphyllum) preaching to hundreds of his brothers. A little later the whole hillside under the century-old trees blossoms out, for the foam flower ( 7Yarella cordifolia) and the Canada May- flower ( Jatanthemum Canadense) hide the many violets as they change from yellow to white and to purple, and the glad yellow of the Clintonia borealis grows richer in the moss. Here, in summer, the Pale Laurel. wax-like members of the heath family tempt us by their profusion, for the shin-leaf, or lily-of-the-valley ( Pyrola elliptica ) grows in beds by the side of the shining-leaved Princes’ pine, or Pipsissewa (Chzmeophila umbellata ), near the beautiful, one-flowered pyrola ( Joneses grandt- flora), and their degenerate cousin, the parasitic Indian pipe ( J/ono- tropa uniflora ), the ghost-flower, or corpse plant, hides its pure white stalks in the depths of the woods among the dead leaves. The brook at the edge of the woods runs murmuring through the meadow and loses itself beneath the heavy growth beyond. On the hillside huge boulders lie strewn about in picturesque abandon, as if just from the hands of giants wearied in play. From the woods little streams come trickling to the meadow, making nooks and dells and glens, where the ferns, undisturbed, speak in every delicate frond, of the sanctity of Labrador Tea. nature inviolate, and the harsh noises from the town’s pushing, hustling g, money-inaking factories sink into softness, recalling man’s universal kinship. These rough, worn hill-sides, scarred and seamed 8 by storms, and covered with the growths of a century, with their grassy knolls and beds of flowers, inviting retreats and shady nooks, appeal to the desire for rest and peace instinctive in us all, a longing becoming pathetic in its intensity in such a busy, hard-working town as Gardner. “These shades Are still the abodes of gladness; the thick roof Of green and stirring branches is alive And musical with birds, that sing and sport In wantonness of spirit.” a! ae me? The Uldest Cellar-Hole. On the left from Pearl street, half a mile from the road, almost hidden by the bushes growing around it, is the oldest cellar-hole in Gardner, and the only one whose history is lost. The eighteen-inch stump of a pine tree that grew in its centre indicates an abandonment lone before the settlement of the town. A few narrow, hand-made brick of ancient pattern and the iron crane that once hung in the stone chimney, attest the presence of a white man, as does the deep cellar itself ; but all else is gone forever. In these woods a favored maiden once found the rare white ladies’ slipper ( Cypripedium candidum ), perhaps the only one ever found in Worcester County. “ddild NVIGON! 3O G38 V Io Just beyond the town ‘‘dump’’ on Pearl street, on the knoll, is a cellar hole once occupied by the house of Bezaleel Hill, who left town in 1812. He was a famous inventor, an original of Darius Green, as he invented a flying machine and, with great wings on his arms, leaped from his second-story window. ‘The story runs that he said the flying was all right, but it was the stopping that hurt. Slowly we leave these woods ‘““Where, when the sunshine struck a yellow shade The rugged trunks, to inward peeping sight Thronged in dark pillars up the gold green light,”’ to drive straight on to Westminster, all the way a delight. Worthington Park. The delicate wild geranium ( Geranium maculatum ) and, in sum- mer, the wood lily ( Leltum Philadelphicum ) and clover head polygala ( Polygala sanguinea ) brighten the roadside with their beds of color. Or we may turn through Temple street and go under the railroad to climb Barber hill, and then by little-used roads past Tophet swamp to the village of Westminster, returning through the woods and swamps on the ‘‘turnpike’’ to South Gardner, picking the white swamp honey- suckle ( Rhododendron viscosum) blooming in the very midst of the 193 xX. hs, -°* 5 ‘ J 3 Ry, . Lt mee i eg wi a ¥ ” * Wa iy aN XG 3 7 » ¥ xf . a # ed ay ‘ be Lm * Be le i Fs 4 es ‘ i é ey Wa 2 % ; ¢ oil” ¥ AZALEA,. 12 waters, and the snake’s head ( Chelone glabra ) showing white in the edge of the woods. The old County road did not run through these swamps, but bore off to the south, passing over the hill above the Baptist church, past Wright's mill and on the side hill just below the original Jonathan Greenwood house, a route long ago discontinued and now almost oblit- erated. Near the old cellar-hole on the top of Wright’s hill, where the first house (burned in 1808) built by Joseph Wright stood, is the Columbine. ancient well, and by its side a large stone with a circular hollow in its top that the family used for many years as a wash basin. It was possi- bly in use before their. time by the Indians as a mortar for grinding corn. The Old Quag. A visit, one day in early spring, to the ‘‘old quag’’ by the railroad, near East street, a favorite resort of the village boys for generations, rewarded us with the purple blossoms of the pitcher-plant (Sarracenia purpurea ); the fresh and attractive white stalks of the buckbean (Menyanthes trifoliata), a rare flower in Worcester County, at first sight suggesting an orchid; the slender and delicate white Sydlacina trifolia, which almost unconsciously is called Lily-of-the-valley ; from 13 the fringe of bushes at the land’s edge, the woolly-leaved Labrador tea (Ledum latifolium ), a rare and radiant shrub found in few towns in the county, and the bell blossoms of the low-bush blueberry ( Vaccintum vacillans ). Here, beside the brilliant blossoms of the rhodora (Rhododendron rho- dora) that lighten the bleak bareness of the bushes just budding into leaf, in the middle of the swamp, just above the water we find, also, an earlier and exceed- ingly graceful sister of the mountain laurel, the delt- Cate tragcile pale laurel ( Aalmia glauca We. The treacherous moss sinks deep into the water as we cross it, and the air-holes catch us, drawing us into their Pogonia. depths until we fairly gasp at the rush of cold waters, the thick, slimy ooze under the tangled roots holding the feet with almost overpowering suction. But it is a rich treasure house of flowers, a delight anda joy to remember forever after—just such a bed as would attract the con fairest and daintiest of New England’s ra ae ee] jewels—the brightest colored and choicest : = of the flowers. Pearl street, itself, leads to Ashburn- ham Centre and Meeting-house Hill, with | opal its wonderful views. It is well worth climb- ae ing the great hill to stand on the north brow and look across the Naukeags with their wooded islands, ‘‘when the gold of &% evening meets the dusk of night;’’ a view unsurpassed, save, perhaps, on Lake ime a George. On the way home, in late sum- mer, we find a rattlesnake orchis ( Good- ser We vera pubescens ) by the roadside, and note the curious mark- ings of the leaves. We may drive straight on from Pearl street to the very edge of the town, to Worthington 'Park, at the end of the road, 14 THE HOME OF THE AZALEA. 15 and looking at the fire-scorched ruins, reflect upon the transitory mna- ture of all earthly plans. Between the high cellar-walls the fireweed ( Epilobium augustifolium ) glows with brilliant color, contrasting with the blackened trunks of the ancient trees. Then to the right, down the steep hill, we ride for an hour or more, on winding roads, through thicket and brush, ‘““A land of trees, which reaching round about, In shady blessing stretched their old arms out, With spots of sunny openings,”’ Moccasin Flower. in the shade of maple, pine and oak woods, silent, cool, and filled with beauties, where ‘The pines are whispering in the breeze Whispering—then hushing, half in awe— Their legends of primeval seas,”’ emerging finally upon the broad highway in the middle of Ashburn- ham, to return through the long village street at the Junction. 16 Chapel Street. Or, we may take the Beech Hill road to Westminster, and, on the right, enter an abandoned road that plunges at once into brush and brier, where the tall grass reaches to the carriage. Ona low rise of land fronting the shining rails of the railroad, are the cellar-holes of several buildings, with fruit trees run wild around them. Cherries hang ripe and red on the trees ; lilac bushes, luxuri- ant in their abandonment, flaunt their colors on either side above the cellar, where the decaying timbers are overrun with raspberries, the fruit large, rich and tempting. But when we learn the story ofthe place, we remember with regret. Many years ago this was a thriving New England farm, with sons and daugh- ters around the hearthstone looking forward to life’s Siac: blessings. ‘To this house- hold disease suddenly came —a foul and loathsome disease that struck down one after another, and drove in horror every friend and neighbor from them. ‘The father, taken ill, died of small-pox, and was hastily buried on the farm itself. The house became as if accursed. Provisions were brought only to the wall down the road. Inn- agine, if you can, the last sad scene of this pitiful history, when the mother, alone with her sick, in her sorrow and almost broken by the strain of Andalusite Crystals. her weeks of watching, stood OG ey Takes) all one night by the bedside of her dying child. ‘Then she went away forever. So the buildings were left to decay, with a horror attached, that for years has kept all human kind away from them, leaving the lonely graves to grow each passing year more lonely, — 17 ‘““Where roses blossomed, branches now o’erspread ; The mournful ruins bid the spirit weep, The broken fragments stay the passing tread.”’ On the left is where a soldier in the French and Indian wars set- tled, Chapel, for whom the street was named. He died in 1820, at the age of one hundred and three years, the oldest person who has died in Gardner. The swamp across the railroad entices us with its promises of hid- den treasures, for here from the sphagnum moss in the water, among Saba EL AO ‘““Where Roses Blossomed.”’ the white blossoms of the cranberry ( Vaccin?um macrocarpon ), spring one of the prettiest of the orchis family, the pink flower of the beauti- ful beard ( Pogonia ophioglossiodes,. And its beautiful sister, the In- dian pink ( Calopogon pulchellus ) is near, its rich purple blossoms con- trasting strangely delicate beside the cat-tails. Careless of everything, save the delight of communing with Nature in her home, we wade far out into the treacherous waters to find the wild calla ( Cala palustris ) hiding its pure white petals in the very heart of the swamp, reserving its beauties for those who love it and seek it in its retreat. In early spring the flower masses of white almost cover the waters—a beautiful picture. 18 We may goon over Beech hill to enjoy the views, or turn sharply to the right to cross the country to the Betty Spring road near West- minster, returning laden with flowers, and listening to ‘The breeze murmuring in the musical woods Where the embowering trees recede, and leave A little space of green expanse.”’ The Worth Roads. From the Windsor House as a starting point, we drive north ex- pectantly, for the woods run together for miles and the houses are few. We may go to the right over Matthews’ hill, with berries in abundance The Purple Fringed Orchis at Home. on either side, and keep on through the swamp, past ancient home- steads indicated by abandoned cellar-holes, to Pearl street; or go north to the end of the road at the Nashua reservoir, enjoying every rod of the wooded drive. But when the day is young and we want a long drive, we go on past the great elm at Page’s (the largest in Gardner ) through woods that seldom see a carriage, where ‘* * * fantastic aisles Wind from the sight in brightness and are lost Among the crowded pillars,’’ 19 over a brush-grown road that leads for miles without a house, through the swamps, where, in June, “The Atlantic June, Whose calendar of perfect days is kept By daily blossoming of some new flower.”’ the azalea ( Rhododendron nudiflorum ) blooms on acres and acres of bushes, where the moccasin flower, or lady’s slipper ( Cypripedium acaule), another of the orchis family, boasts its careless wealth of color, and where the columbine ( Aguzleg7a Canadensis ), daintiest and most graceful of flowers, welcomes us to her home on the fern-covered bank. Every little while we passa deserted ‘‘ cellar-hole’’ and tell again the varying life histories of their former owners ; some sad, some tragic, all pathetic. All the way we delight inthe profusion of flowers, for the pyrola and its white sisters lie in beds about us, the Indian-pipe is under almost every bush and by every log, while the one-flowered pyrola, the exquisite star of the M/oneses grandiflora, forces an excla- mation of genuine pleasure from us, when we see a great bed of its pure white, waxy petals under the spreading branches of a pine. Abundant in this vicinity, it is unknown elsewhere in the county. The swamps in the woods fairly glow with the beautiful blossoms of the purple-fringed orchis ( Habenarta fimbriata ), most precious and most sought-for of all the season’s flowers. How the heart thrills at the first sight of the delicate, fragile blossoms gleaming white against the dark background of the woods. Here in the dense woods, where the sun never shines, ‘‘In the deep glen, or the close shade of pines,”’ we find the great green orchis ( Habenaria orbiculata ), whose large, full-orbed leaves add to its royal dignity. At the four corners we can go west to force a narrow way through brush that sadly scratches the carriage to the little red schoolhouse on the main Winchendon road; and once we used to go east to the Junc- tion, but now the road is discontinued. Here in the swamps, the curt- ous fly-trap, or pitcher plants ( Savracenia purpurea ), grow in hundreds and we watch them ‘« How at the dawn they wake, and open wide Their little petal windows ”’ safe here from all intrusion by man, and ‘“The passion they express all day In burning color, steals forth with the dew All night in odor.’ and the ragged fringed-orchis ( Habenaria lacera) keeps them com- pany. Sowe keep straight on to leave the woods at last at the Astor 20 ‘‘Leafless are the trees; their purple branches Spread themselves abroad, like reefs of coral rising silent In the Red Sea of the winter sunset.”’ 21 House, the old tavern on the turnpike at Burrageville, in North Ash- burnham, the home of the yellow meadow or Canada lily, the fairies’ or witches’ cap (Lilium Canadense), whose branched stems and graceful drooping bells remind us of candelabra in some ancient cathedral. The meadows and even the roadside are rich to prodigality with the golden bells, and the delicate, smaller purple fringed-orchis (Habenaria psycodes) growing ‘* Beside a brook in mossy forest dell”’ hardly lessens our admiration by the glory of its richer beauty. By the bridge we once picked a meadow-rue ( 7halictrum large cluster of purple purpurascens), more sister. We return by the little red school- delicate than its graceful the great mill-dam and house, where the roads side, ina little way, corner eight different roads at its own peculiar and is the old toll-road, bring- corner, and on either in fours again, making our service, each with inviting charms. One ing us out near the climbs the great hill, under Town Farm; another and passing for miles Pitcher Plant. Ragged Fringed Orchis. Great Green Orchis. ‘“green-robed senators of mighty woods, Tall oaks, branch-charmed by the earnest stars ” becomes Stone street, in Gardner, one of the prettiest drives in town; and by another we go to old Winchendon to enjoy a particularly fine view of Monadnock on the way. All through these woods we catch glimpsés of the brown rabbit hopping along in front of us, and every little while the whir-r-r of the partridge startles us from our reveries. Once we drove into the midst 22 of a young family, and instantly the mother-bird fluttered by the carriage, apparently hurt unto death, causing eager pursuit through the bushes until she had led us a safe distance; then, recovering, she flew far away; we almost fancied we heard a laugh as she left us. Her little, brown-backed children hid themselves under the brush, keeping absolutely quiet while we stood over them watching their nervous heart throbbings. Meadow Lily. The long, bushy tail of the fox is sometimes seen disappearing 9 through the bushes ahead, indicating ‘‘ good hunting’’ here, and the dust in summer and the snow in winter bear the imprint of the raccoon in almost perfect imitation of a baby’s foot. The red squirrel abounds, for nuts are plenty, and, with the wood- pecker for company, an occasional chipmunk or rare gray squirrel fill the woods with life. iS) WwW SNOWY OWL, 24 Otters once frequented the river named from them, Otter River, and are still found there; a wildcat was recently killed near the Nashua reservoir, and a Snowy Owl, from Canada, in 1882 strayed to its death on Glazier Hill. Ttwo or three deer have visited here in late years, probably driven south by the severe winters. The Kneeland ADaids. Crime, sorrow, disease, the wrong of man to man, and man to woman have not spared our peaceful town in the century of its life, and the dense growth of its great woods, for miles seldom trodden by man, hide many a dark mystery, the shame of many a crime. As we drive through the West Village with its thronging homes, we turn aside, near the curve in the railroad, to visit a gravel-knoll half a mile from the road, secluded and covered with wood. On this The Kneeland Place. low hill, (debris of a moraine dating from the glacial epoch) a hunter, a few years since, found in the shade of a tree a withered human body, with a rope around the neck and a broken end hanging from a limb overhead. He had lain there two or three years, unknown, unseen, perhaps never missed. The mystery of the suicide remains to this day unsolved, and, buried on the spot, the sleep of the faint-heart continues unbroken under the tree he chose, in a lonely and soon-to-be-forgotten grave. We linger a moment near here, in the bed of the brook, to rejoice in the wealth of flowers that greets us on every side, for the purple monkey-face (A/imulus ringens) hides under the bushes, with the 26 skull-cap (Scutellaria galericulata) beside it; near by the dainty blue and yellow of the ‘‘ruby grape of Proserpine,’’ the nightshade (.So/- anum dulcamara) hangs close to to the golden blossoms of the jewel- weed (/upatiens pallida); below us the pool is white with arrow head ( Saggttaria variabilis) ; from our feet rises a great club of thorough- ‘The red pennons of the cardinal flowers Hang motionless upon their upright staves.”’ wort, or boneset ( Aupatorium perfoliatum ), while in the foreground the brilliant cardinal-flower ( Lobelia cardinalis), High Priest of the Tabernacle, stands stately, erect and magnificent in all the bright glory of its coloring. Then on through the valley, where the swamp flowers abound, white lies he in the sun, and, late in the summer, great beds of purple asters, harbingers of autumn, fill the roadside with their masses of star- like blossoms. Turning to the right in East Templeton, we swing rapidly down the long, exhilerating curves of the hill to Bailey brook, through woods that the twin-flower ( Lzxn@a borealis) loves, and the 27 air is filled with its fragrance—one of the flowers that conduce to thought, through which “Ever the words of the gods resound ; But the porches of man’s ear Seldom, in this life’s low round, Are unsealed, that he may hear.” The twin-flower is no longer found in Worcester county outside of the few northern towns, so the great beds in Gardner are especially inter- esting. As we return on the circuit, at the head of Parker’s pond and the junction of Wilder and Kneeland brooks, almost within sound of the Near the Kneeland Place. busy life of Gardner, we find, by the foot of a tall tree, a faint cellar- hole marking the site of the home of the Kneeland Maids. ‘They were two aged sisters, daughters of Timothy Kneeland, one of the earliest settlers in Gardner, found beaten to death in their beds in March, 1855. The buildings were destroyed by fire the following May, and a crime that filled the whole state with horror, and caused, to the timid, fear and apprehension for many a long year thereafter—a crime that was as brutal and cowardly as any in the history of the Commonwealth, went unpunished by man, and after forty years leaves the ashes of a once ‘happy home its only reminder. Or keep on through East ‘Templeton, turning to look at the great blossoms on the tulip-tree ( Liviodendron tulipifera ) at the corner of the Parkhurst house-lot, and as you climb the long Ladder hill, note an 28 RHODORA. 29 especially attractive view—Gardner and its multitude of houses framed in by the walls of earth. All roads that are before you are invit- ing, but if you have the time, go down into and across the Ware River valley, through the Four Corners, and swing home through Phillipston Centre and Goulding Village, across the Great Meadows, where pout and pickerel thrive. On such a trip, if in late July, one may find, ina hollow between the Phillipston hills, a great cluster of purple loose- strife ( Lythrum salicaria ) crowning the marsh, standing as brilliantly erect as in its native land in the days of Ophelia. Bickford-Travers Mill-Dam. “There is a willow grows aslant a brook That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream, There with fantastic garlands did she come Of crow flowers, nettles, daisies and long purples That liberal shepherds give a grosser name, But our cold maids do dead men’s fingers call them.” To get far away fromthe noise of the town, turn south from East Templeton to Hubbardston, over Mine hill. The road terraces the steep hillside, with precipitous depths beneath in the shadows of the woods; the curves under the hill reminding us of the famous Geyser 30 grade. Here the railing is for actual use, and we can almost level with our eyes the top of the tall hemlock that grows just below the road. ‘“Steep is the side * * * shaggy and wild With mossy trees and pinnacles of flint And many a hanging crag.”’ It makes little difference whether you return by the way of Ragged hill and through the long woods below the Pail Factory, where the Mayflower ( /:figwa repens ) first blooms every spring, and ‘‘the green vistas arch like the hollows of mighty waves of some crystalline sea ;”’ or go on through Hubbardston in a wilderness of drives; a glorious prospect, with woods and ponds alternating in an unending pageant of pleasure. The wild calla ( Calla palustris) haunts the swamps, and we pick several varieties of tick-trefoil as we drive along. ‘The morn* ing-glory ( Convolvulus Americanus ) bells cover the walls and rock- piles, and the wild bean ( Apios tuberosa) barricades the banks. Re- turning from Hubbardston with a bunch of brilliant red Oswego tea- heads ( A7onarda didyma ) we drive slowly by the old mill-dam of the Bickford mill, the first built in town, destroved by fire August 20, 1895. On Kendali hill, behind the station, where the old turnpike crossed the brow of the hill, a few elms still stand sentinel over the site of the Jackson house, the first house built in Gardner. Here the ‘ bright chalices’’ of the painted-cup ( Castilleta coccinea ) glow “Tnithe green like flakes of fire,’’ its scarlet tufts “Tinted thus to hold the dew for fairies.’’ From photo by F. H. Brown, Jackson House. Built 1764" On Gla3ter Hill. One of the earliest settlers had the courage (and love of nature ) to build his house on the top of Glazier hill, where the reservoir now is. He sold in 1772, to John Glazier, from whom the hill takes its present name. The house now stands on Morrill street, and is the oldest in town. In it was held the first town meeting in Gardner. As we climb the hill, the winding road brings us fresh surprises at every turn, for we are on a great pyramid with all the Commonwealth spread out before us, and * * ® « * “The mountains that infold In their wide sweep, the colored landscape round, Seem groups of giant kings, in purple and gold, That guard the enchanted ground.”’ Twin Flower. From the first blush of morning, mantling the face of Wachusett, standing huge and solitary in the plain, twelve miles away to the south, to the last red arrow shot by the setting sun against the dark blue mass of Monadnock, watchman of the Northern hills, one of the ‘“Mountain columns with which earth props heaven;”’ from the faint gray ‘‘The pure mist—the pity of the sea Coming as a soft white hand,”’ to curtain the beds of the flowers in the swamps in early morning, to the drawing of the fog-covers over the rivers, reflecting golden glories co) 32 of the sky at sunset; we watch the wonderful transformations, as the sun lights up the woodlands, shadows the long lines of hills, and turns the ‘Waters resting in the embrace of the wide forest,”’ into quivering glowing quicksilver, instinct with life, and color and beauty ‘“A hundred hills their dusky backs upheaved All over this still ocean; and beyond Far, far beyond, the solid vapour stretched In headlands, tongues and promontory shapes,’’ and all the fair land at our feet reminds us of the gardens of Armidas of which Tasso sings, ‘*Still lakes of silver, streams that murm’ring crept, Hills, on whose sloping brows the sunbeams slept ; Luxuriant trees, that various forms displayed, And valleys, grateful with refreshing shade ; Herbs, flow’rets, gay with many a gaudy dye, And wood, and arching grottos meet the eye.”’ Last of Its Race. 33 < TSI] a4} 07 uado Sunms sT[Iy ayy, }YSIU wor pouin} Aemyjed ino uappne,, fe Pe ft ne ite i aa oy ia iia eS Il 34