A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf by John Muir - HTML preview

Footnotes

 [1] Alphonso Wood, Class-book of Botany, with a Flora of The United States and Canada. The copy of this work, carried by Mr. Muir on his wanderings, is still extant. The edition is that of 1862.

 [2] The previously mentioned copy of Wood’s Botany, used by John Muir, quotes on the title page 1 Kings iv, 33: “He spake of trees, from the cedar of Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall.”

 [3] Wood’s Botany, edition of 1862, furnishes the following interesting comment on Liatris odoratissima (Willd.), popularly known as Vanilla Plant or Deer’s Tongue: “The fleshy leaves exhale a rich fragrance even for years after they are dry, and are therefore by the southern planters largely mixed with their cured tobacco, to impart its fragrance to that nauseous weed.”

 [4] Muir’s journal contains the following additional note: “M. County produces $5000 worth a year of ginseng root, valued at seventy cents a pound. Under the law it is not allowed to be gathered until the first of September.”

 [5] In his journal Muir spells the name “Hiawassee,” a form which occurs on many of the older maps. The name probably is derived from the Cherokee Indian “Ayuhwasi,” a name applied to several of their former settlements.

 [6] The old Indian name for the southern species of fox-grape, Vitis rotundifolia, which Muir describes here. Wood’s Botany listed it as Vitis vulpina L. and remarks, “The variety called ‘Scuppernong’ is quite common in southern gardens.”

 [7] Of the original journal.

 [8] Of the original journal.

 [9] Doubtless January 12, 1868.

 [10] At this point the journal ends. The remainder of this chapter is taken from a letter written to Mrs. Ezra S. Carr from the neighborhood of Twenty Hill Hollow in July, 1868.

 [11] Near Snelling, Merced County, California.

 [12] This is the hub of the region where Mr. Muir spent the greater part of the summer of 1868 and the spring of 1869.

[13] Mr. Muir doubtless meant the golden eagle (Aquila chrysaëtos).