Some Winter Days in Iowa

n the drift, rounded the sharp ridges, filled up the deep valleys and gorges, and gave to Iowa her fertile and inexhaustible soil. The earth was prepared to receive her king. The glaciers receded. Man came.

Now here, on this bit of limestone rock, the struggle is on again. The mosses and the lichens have proceeded far enough in their work of disintegration to provide substance for the slender red stem of dogwood, which is growing out of the soil they have made. The fallen leaves of the surrounding trees follow the pioneer work of the mosses. The rain and the cracking frosts are other agencies. By and by the organic will triumph over the inorganic, the cell over the crystal, the plant over the rock, and where now the fossils lie beautiful flowers will bloom.

The short winter day draws rapidly to a close and there is time for only a brief survey of the beauty of the upland trees. The fairy-like delicacy of the hop hornbeam, with its hop clusters and pointing catkins; the slender gracefulness of th