48 WILD FLOWERS OF SCOTLAND 



among our Scottish wild flowers, without including 

 many another of the same den in our Index Ex- 

 purgatorius. 



A defile of much more modest dimensions seems 

 even richer than this, inasmuch as the many rarities 

 are gathered into a narrower space. It has been 

 called a paradise of flowers. I always suspect these 

 paradises, where the wildlings I had searched for, 

 separately, over many miles, are all huddled within 

 a few yards, and mingled with other flowers not 

 growing elsewhere outside an enclosure. I find 

 myself asking for a reason. 



Early in the year the rocks dipping steeply down 

 to the cool water are covered over with the great 

 heart-shaped leaves, and brightened with the big 

 yellow flowers of Leopard's bane. A faint sweet 

 smell woos me aside to the violets growing among 

 the grasses of a bank. Though acquainted with 

 every yard of the country, I know no other bank 

 on which the sweet violet nods. Why should it be 

 here ? 



Not fifty yards away, on the very edge of the 

 rocks o'ertopping the Leopard's bane, is another 

 castle of sixteenth-century date, once in possession 

 of the Grahams, kinsmen of "Bonnie Dundee." 

 Not much more than a stone's - throw away, 



