The Open Air 



their habits have become attuned to the sun, and it 

 is no special strain upon them. In India our troops 

 are carefully looked after in the hot weather, and 

 everything made as easy for them as possible ; with- 

 out care and special clothing and coverings for the 

 head they could not long endure. The English 

 simoon of heat drops suddenly on the heads of the 

 harvesters and finds them entirely unprepared; they 

 have not so much as a cooling drink ready ; they face 

 it, as it were, unarmed. The sun spares not; it is 

 fire from morn till night. Afar in the town the sun- 

 blinds are up, there is a tent on the lawn in the shade, 

 people drink claret-cup and use ice; ice has never 

 been seen in the harvest-field. Indoors they say they 

 are melting lying on a sofa in a darkened room, made 

 dusky to keep out the heat. The fire falls straight 

 from the sky on the heads of the harvesters men, 

 women, and children and the white-hot light beats 

 up again from the dry straw and the hard ground. 



The tender flowers endure; the wide petal of the 

 poppy, which withers between the fingers, lies afloat 

 on the air as the lilies on water, afloat and open to 

 the weight of the heat. The red pimpernel looks 

 straight up at the sky from the early morning till its 

 hour of closing in the afternoon. Pale blue speed- 

 well does not fade; the pale blue stands the warmth 

 equally with the scarlet. Far in the thick wheat the 

 streaked convolvulus winds up the stalks, and is not 

 smothered for want of air though wrapped and circled 

 with corn. Beautiful though they are, they are 

 bloodless, not sensitive; we have given to them our 

 feelings, they do not share our pain or pleasure. Heat 

 has gone into the hollow stalks of the wheat and down 

 the yellow tubes to the roots, drying them in the earth. 

 Heat has dried the leaves upon the hedge, and they 



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