Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts 2.djvu/90

 rotundifolia. The little brake grew in clefts of the sandstone; and there were many bank-swallows' nests in and under the pillared and turreted (coped?) sandstone, so hard that you could not make the hole with your hand,—or would not. Dock, perhaps Rumex altissimus (the prevailing kind up and down the Mississippi), grows in immense quantities, three to six feet high, for miles on the low sand and clays of the flat shore. What kind? Its leaves are a foot or more long, narrow, and more or less wavy; its root yellow. Also I saw a smaller red-stemmed kind, with long pedicles and quite different. Between the docks, the clotbur-like plant, and the bittersweet vine,—all very abundant.

What was the fine, diffusely-branched crucifer (cardamine-like), with lower lyrate leaves, white petals longer than calyx, pods convex and an inch or more long? An ash, with very smooth and bright-glowing, dark-green leaves stood above. The meek, reed-like Veronica. What was the broad-leaved, large crucifer, not in seed, two feet high, stem somewhat downy or hairy at base?