38 WILD FLOWERS OF SCOTLAND 



needed to those vagrant butterflies. So far, it 

 stands at a disadvantage with its rival. Growing 

 singly or in clusters, and not in masses, it does not 

 attract the eye from a distance, as a glow of colour. 

 But it is almost everywhere, which the other is not. 

 It fringes the edges of the cornfields, climbs the 

 mountain-sides till it meets the lower alpines, 

 where I have seen it white as the mountain 

 hares of winter ; and runs down to the coast till it 

 is washed by the salt spray, where I have also seen 

 it white : on either site, when bleached, it scarcely 

 looks like itself. 



Chiefly is it a moorland wildling, companion of 

 the meadow pipit and the nesting plover. And 

 in such moors Scotland abounds. From June on- 

 ward, every golf-ball driven on St. Andrews links 

 rings the wandering chimes to the blue seaside 

 butterflies. Levelled for a moment, it swiftly 

 rises again, and, ere the golfer passes, it is already 

 trembling in the light breeze as if nothing had 

 happened. 



It is gathered by school children, in those 

 delightful autumn weeks spent by the seaside or on 

 inland moor. It blooms for a while along with the 

 marguerite, to whose calm beauty it adds fairy- 

 like grace. And when the reign of marguerite 



