GRASSY PLACES. 279 



must be so again ? Each dread epidemic that sweeps 

 across Europe warns us that water is holy, whether 

 priest-blessed or no. Why is tree-worship found in 

 every clime where trees can grow ? Because in times 

 before the dawn of history, beyond the ages of bronze 

 and stone, the tree supported human life. Dim 

 memories of the distant past, inherited through a 

 thousand generations, cause us to look on trees with 

 pleasure and delight. 



And so it is with grass. Our ancestors may have 

 fed their cattle in some verdant glade. A " Grassy 

 place " was to them the means of life. The sight of 

 grass rejoiced men in the shepherd state, for it meant 

 rest and plenty, its absence was hunger and despair. 

 Therefore to us, their descendants, each " Grassy 

 place " is pleasant still ; therefore the crown of grass 

 was held in higher honour than the diadem of gold. 



The village of St. Vallier, above Grasse, instead 

 of clinging to the mountain side, like most of the 

 Riviera hamlets, stands in a grassy plain which ex- 

 tends up to the very walls of the houses. At harvest 

 time you may count on this common hundreds of corn 

 stacks, for all the farmers of the district store their 

 grain here until it can be threshed. Seen from the 

 hills above, this meadow, with its tent-like ranks of 

 piled up wheat, resembles an encampment ; but the 

 rich study in green and gold suggests more peaceful 

 thoughts. 



Still higher up, at Caussols, 3,800 feet above sea- 

 level, yet within easy reach of Grasse, and overlooking 

 the coast, is a stretch of grass some three or four miles 

 long, as green as any in the Emerald Isle, and level as 

 the surface of a lake ; a tapis vert on which no money 



