Nature Near London | Page 8

dry ground and disappearing in the (to them)
mighty chasm of another.
Tiny green "hoppers"--odd creatures shaped something like the fancy
frogs of children's story-books--alight upon it after a spring, and
pausing a second, with another toss themselves as high as the highest
bennet (veritable elm-trees by comparison), to fall anywhere out of
sight in the grass. Reddish ants hurry over. Time is money; and their
business brooks no delay.
Bee-like flies of many stripes and parti-coloured robes face you,
suspended in the air with wings vibrating so swiftly as to be unseen;
then suddenly jerk themselves a few yards to recommence hovering. A
greenfinch rises with a yellow gleam and a sweet note from the grass,
and is off with something for his brood, or a starling, solitary now, for
his mate is in the nest, startled from his questing, goes straight away.
Dark starlings, greenfinch, gilded fly, glistening beetle, blue butterfly,
humble bee with scarf about his thick waist, add their moving dots of
colour to the surface. There is no design, no balance, nothing like a
pattern perfect on the right-hand side, and exactly equal on the

left-hand. Even trees which have some semblance of balance in form
are not really so, and as you walk round them so their outline changes.
Now the path approaches a stile set deep in thorns and brambles, and
hardly to be gained for curved hooks and prickles. But on the briars
June roses bloom, arches of flowers over nettles, burdock, and rushes in
the ditch beneath. Sweet roses--buds yet unrolled, white and conical;
roses half open and pink tinted; roses widespread, the petals curling
backwards on the hedge, abandoning their beauty to the sun. In the
pasture over the stile a roan cow feeds unmoved, calmly content,
gathering the grass with rough tongue. It is not only what you actually
see along the path, but what you remember to have seen, that gives it its
beauty.
From hence the path skirts the hedge enclosing a copse, part of which
had been cut in the winter, so that a few weeks since in spring the
bluebells could be seen, instead of being concealed by the ash branches
and the woodbine. Among them grew one with white bells, like a lily,
solitary in the midst of the azure throng. A "drive," or green lane
passing between the ash-stoles, went into the copse, with tufts of
tussocky grass on either side and rush bunches, till farther away the
overhanging branches, where the poles were uncut, hid its course.
Already the grass has hidden the ruts left by the timber carriages--the
last came by on May-day with ribbons of orange, red, and blue on the
horses' heads for honour of the day. Another, which went past in the
wintry weeks of the early year, was drawn by a team wearing the
ancient harness with bells under high hoods, or belfries, bells well
attuned, too, and not far inferior to those rung by handbell men. The
beat of the three horses' hoofs sounds like the drum that marks time to
the chime upon their backs. Seldom, even in the far away country, can
that pleasant chime be heard.
But now the timber is all gone, the ruts are hidden, and the tall spruce
firs, whose graceful branches were then almost yellow with young
needles on the tip, are now clothed in fresh green. On the bank there is
a flower which is often gathered for the forget-me-not, and is not unlike
it at the first glance; but if the two be placed side by side, this, the

scorpion grass, is but a pale imitation of the true plant; its petals vary in
colour and are often dull, and it has not the yellow central spot. Yet it is
not unfrequently sold in pots in the shops as forget-me-not. It flowers
on the bank, high above the water of the ditch.
The true forget-me-not can hardly be seen in passing, so much does it
nestle under flags and behind sedges, and it is not easy to gather
because it flowers on the very verge of the running stream. The shore is
bordered with matted vegetation, aquatic grass, and flags and weeds,
and outside these, where its leaves are washed and purified by the clear
stream, its blue petals open. Be cautious, therefore, in reaching for the
forget-me-not, lest the bank be treacherous.
It was near this copse that in early spring I stayed to gather some white
sweet violets, for the true wild violet is very nearly white. I stood close
to a hedger and ditcher, who, standing on a board, was cleaning out the
mud that the water might run freely. He went on with his work, taking
not the least notice of an idler, but intent