ee - WOODS AND FIELDS 191 
and tempt us gradually out into the green 
fields. 
What pleasant memories these very words 
recall, games in the hay as children, and sunny 
summer days throughout life. 
“Consider,” says Ruskin,’ “ what we owe 
to the meadow grass, to the covering of the 
dark ground by that glorious enamel, by 
the companies of those soft countless and 
peaceful spears. The fields! Follow but 
forth for a little time the thought of all that 
we ought to recognise in those words. All 
spring and summer is in them—the walks 
by silent scented paths, the rests in noonday 
heat, the joy of herds and flocks, the power 
of all shepherd life and meditation, the life of 
sunlight upon the world, falling in emerald 
streaks, and soft blue shadows, where else it 
would have struck on the dark mould or 
scorching dust, pastures beside the pacing 
brooks, soft banks and knolls of lowly hills, 
thymy slopes of down overlooked by the blue 
line of lifted sea, crisp lawns all dim with 
early dew, or smooth in evening warmth of 
1 Modern Painters. . 
