70 IRature Stubies in Berfcsbire. 



"native" looks with much hope and good cheer 

 upon the aspirations of the summer-boarder toward 

 mountain-tops and rugged heights. It is generally 

 his function to reverse the office of Stockton's official 

 and become the discourager of precipitancy. Only 

 when much experience has taught him that good 

 muscle and wind are often to be found under an out- 

 ing shirt, does he concede the probability that the 

 "city chap" will scale any peak he attempts. So 

 we waived the disparagements which greeted our 

 announcement of determination and turned our steps 

 toward Jug End. 



The walk thither was entrancing. It lay through 

 the levels and the uplands rich in July verdure, 

 through grasses ripe for the mower, and tangles of 

 wild-flowers crowding the wayside ditches with their 

 aggressive ranks, lining up and touching elbows for 

 their annual charge upon the farmer's hardly con- 

 quered domain. The wild-flower is the barbarian of 

 the soil. It holds the same menace over the civilis- 

 ation of the fields that the Persian held over Greece, 

 the Gaul over Rome, the Kelt over Britain, the Indian 

 over America. Let the civilising and cultivating hand 

 be withheld for but a season, and the barbarian weed 

 is over the wall, under the fence, throwing a skirmish- 

 line up the hill, and deploying down the valley. 

 These wild things have a system of warfare all their 

 own. They are invaders by nature. They have 

 been trained for nobody knows how many million 

 years in the art of beating any form of life less ener- 



