144 NATURE NEAR LONDON 



up; the first bennet is to green things what the first 

 swallow is to the breathing creatures of summer. 



On a bare bough, but lately scourged by the east wind, 

 the apple bloom appears, set about with the green of the 

 hedges and the dark spruce behind. White horse-chest- 

 nut blooms stand up in their stately way, lighting the 

 path which is strewn with the green moss-like flowers 

 fallen from the oaks. There is an early bush of May. 

 When the young apples take form and shape the grass is 

 so high even the buttercups are overtopped by it. Along 

 the edge of the roadside footpath, where the dandelions, 

 plantains, and grasses are thick with seed, the green- 

 finches come down and feed. 



Now the apples are red that are left, and they hang 

 on boughs from which the leaves are blown by every 

 gust. But it does not matter when you pass, summer 

 or autumn, this little orchard has always something 

 to offer. It is not neglected it is true attention 

 to leave it to itself. 



Left to itself, so that the grass reaches its fullest 

 height ; so that bryony vines trail over the bushes and 

 stay till the berries fall of their own ripeness ; so that 

 the brown leaves lie and are not swept away unless 

 the wind chooses ; so that all things follow their own 

 course and bent. The hedge opposite in autumn, when 

 reapers are busy with the sheaves, is white with the large 

 trumpet flowers of the great wild convolvulus (or bind- 

 weed). The hedge there seems made of convolvulus 

 then; nothing but convolvulus, and nowhere else does 

 the flower flourish so strongly; the bines remain till 

 the following spring. 



Without a path through it, without a border or parterre, 

 un visited, and left alone, the orchard has acquired an 

 atmosphere of peace and stillness, such as grows up in 



