July 11, 1857

The cymbidium is really a splendid flower, with its spike two or three inches long, of commonly three or five large, irregular, concave, star-shaped purple flowers, amid the cool green meadow-grass. I has an agreeable fragrance withal. I see more berries than usual of the Rubus triflorus in the open meadow near the southeast corner of the Hubbard meadow blueberry swamp. Call it, perhaps, Cymbidium meadow. They are dark shining red and, when ripe, of a very agreeable flavor and somewhat of the raspberry’s spirit. Petty morel not yet, by the bars this side Corner Spring; nor is the helianthus there budded yet. Apocynum cannabinum, with its small white flowers and narrow sepals half as long as whole corolla, apparently two or three days. The trumpet-weed is already as high as my head, with a rich glaucous bloom on its stem. Indeed, looking off into the vales from Fair Haven Hill, where a thin blue haze now rests almost universally, I see that the earth itself is invested with a glaucous bloom at this season like some fruits and rapidly growing stems.