Many good Republicans and good Democrats (the adjective is
used in its political sense) might have envied him his sunny temper,
joined, as it was, to a good stock of native shrewdness. For something
in his eye made it plain that, with all his other qualities, our merry
greenbacker was a reasonably competent hand at a bargain; so that I was
not in the least surprised when his seat-mate told me afterward, in a
tone of much respect, that the "Colonel" owned a very comfortable
property at St. Augustine. But his best possession, I still thought, was
his humor and his own generous appreciation of it. To enjoy one's own
jokes is to have a pretty safe insurance against inward adversity.
Happily, I say, this good-humored talker sat within hearing. Happily,
too, it was now--April 4--the height of the season for flowering
dogwood, pink azalea, fringe-bushes, Cherokee roses, and water lilies.
All these had blossomed abundantly, and mile after mile the wilderness
and the solitary place were glad for them. Here and there, also, I
caught flying glimpses of some unknown plant bearing a long upright
raceme of creamy-white flowers. It might be a white lupine, I thought,
till at one of our stops between stations it happened to be growing
within reach. Then I guessed it to be a _Baptisia_, which guess was
afterward confirmed--to my regret; for the flowers lost at once all
their attractiveness.
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