7 2 Summer 



beautiful. The flying gold of autumn is not compar- 

 able to the purer hue of early summer. What white 

 can equal the white of a tall hawthorn hedge in bloom ? 

 And none has ever caught, or ever will catch, in words 

 the splendour of such miles upon miles of flowering 

 gorse as you may still see in the north of England, 

 where the fiery sight is rounded by the blue and white 

 of a sunny sea. From the hill slope you may count 

 the white sails (white as the sea-mew's wings), and 

 the black funnels with their trains of smoke. But to 

 landward there is a deep and fertile valley where the 

 half-grown grass gleams like metal in the wind, and 

 great trees, green-mantled solitaries, dose in the sun- 

 shine ; by sedgy margins and banks blue with speed- 

 well, a sleepy river flows through pasture and tilth. 

 At daybreak, when the long shadows lie on every 

 quiet pool, and the scuts of the rabbits show white as 

 they dart through the dewy corn, the very otter-hunter, 

 whose dogs are making merry music down the water, 

 will stop to gladden his eye with the scene. But in 

 the dusk of night it takes on a new and perhaps a 

 more exquisite beauty. The dor-hawk skims the 

 moor with his monotonous churrurr-ing ; the bat is 

 hawking and flying in his silent mysterious way ; the 

 lights of human life are few, and feeble, and remote ; 

 and ere the moon come out, sparkling on the water 

 and brightening the wold, you shall keep your vigil 

 alone in a world of dreams. 



