THE HEDGE-BANK. 47 



different, I am well aware, from the knowledge of 

 God, but compatible with it, and if duly directed, 

 calculated to promote it ; for I cannot believe that 

 He who taught me to search would inculcate a 

 lesson tending to anything but what was for my 

 good. Even now I never pass a spring without 

 unfolding the buds of " Cuckoo-pint," as I did 

 when a child ; not, perhaps, with the same desire 

 of satisfying my curiosity, but impressed with an 

 equal degree of admiration of God's wisdom, and 

 with feelings of deep thankfulness for His good- 

 ness. " Speak to the earth and it shall teach 

 thee," is a precept He conveyed into my mind 

 before I could read, and now that I can read arid 

 understand, I am thankful that this precept was 

 but the stepping-stone to another, " Lift up your 

 eyes on high, and behold who hath created these 

 things." 



While speaking about the Cuckoo-pint, I men- 

 tioned a plant yet more common, which, though 

 not so remarkable in the eye of the casual obser- 

 ver, is perhaps still more worthy of the examina- 

 tion of the curious. This is the Nettle.* " Oh ! 

 those nasty Nettles!" I think I hear you say; 

 " What can there be interesting about them ? " 

 Rough, unsightly-looking plants as they are, no 

 less than three of the most beautiful of our Eng- 

 lish butterflies, when in their larva, or caterpillar 

 state, prefer their leaves to any other food. These 

 are the Peacock, and Smaller Tortoise-shell But- 

 terflies, which you may see, in bright summer 

 weather, flitting about like " winged flowers," or 

 occasionally alighting on some tall thistle, from 

 the long tubular flowers of which they sip up 



* Urtica dioica. 



