82 



KUINS, WALLS, AND WASTE PLACES. 



TIIHE loves of the flowers are as diverse as their 

 ~ forms and colours. Some love the moist bog, 

 others the shady woodland. Some delight in the 

 bracing air of the ocean, others in the quiet meadows. 

 Many love the picturesque ruin, revel by the wayside 

 wall, and rejoice in the small pieces of waste ground 

 which are everywhere met with as we walk along, 



" Pleased 



To muse, and be saluted by the air 

 Of meek repentance, wafting wallflower scents 

 From out the crumbling ruins of fallen pride." 



Very unkindly must be the site that will not afford 

 s home for the earliest of our wild flowers, the little 

 Shepherd's Purse (Capsella bursapastoris). It peeps 

 up beneath the wall, and shows its jagged leaves 

 between the cracks of the pavement. Its little 

 white flowers are succeeded by its numerous heart- 

 shaped seed-cases, which, from their real or supposed 

 resemblance to the old-fashioned leather purses, gave 

 the plant its name. Formerly many virtues were 



