The most primitive places left with us are the swamps, where the spruce still grows shaggy with usnea.

Thus, Arethusa, Cypripedium, Pogonia, Calopogon, Spiranthes, Festuca, Osmunda, Onoclea, Lycopodium, Polytrichum, Bryum, Marchantia, Usnea, Parmelia, Cladonia, Agaricus, Chondrus, and perhaps a few other genera, furnish plants so familiar and so striking that a child will be sure to inquire concerning them, and a general description could easily be framed in a few words which could not mislead him concerning them.

In the low grounds, a considerable proportion of the wood consists of the Southern Cypress, a graceful and magnificent tree, whose appearance would be very lively and cheerful, were it not for the abundance of long trailing "moss" (usnea) that hangs, like funereal drapery, from its branches, and darkens the whole forest.