i INTRODUCTION 19 



matter of much interest to know which 

 aspects of Nature have given the greatest 

 pleasure to, or have most impressed, those 

 who, either from wide experience or from 

 their love of Nature, may be considered best 

 able to judge. I will begin with an English 

 scene from Kingsley. He is describing his 

 return from a day's trout-fishing : 



"What shall we see," he says, " as we look 

 across the broad, still, clear river, where the 

 great dark trout sail to and fro lazily in the 

 sun? White chalk fields above, quivering 

 hazy in the heat. A park full of merry hay- 

 makers ; gay red and blue waggons ; stalwart 

 horses switching off the flies ; dark avenues 

 of tall elms ; groups of abele, 6 tossing their 

 whispering silver to the sun ' ; and amid them 

 the house, a great square red-brick mass, 

 made light and cheerful though by quoins 

 and windows of white Sarsden stone, with 

 high peaked French roofs, broken by louvres 

 and dormers, haunted by a thousand swallows 

 and starlings. Old walled gardens, gay with 

 flowers, shall stretch right and left. Clipt 

 yew alleys shall wander away into mysterious 



