WILD-FLOWERS 391 



the distance, a closer acquaintance with them can 

 reveal a profusion and variety of life but little 

 suspected by those who are strangers to such 

 districts. Although it is somewhat late in the 

 season, many a wild-flower still holds its own. 

 The gentian still blooms, and here and there 

 dropwort and wild mignonette retain some few 

 graceful blossoms. Twice I have gathered cow- 

 slips in mid -October, and later still many a 

 goodly bouquet of wild-flowers. For the most 

 part, the down flowers are small, lowly-growing, 

 and unpretentious little plants. In May the 

 milk-wort makes its appearance, and, surely, no 

 one of our British wild-flowers is more beautiful 

 and delicate here a patch of white, there pink, 

 but most frequently of deepest sapphire hue, 

 dazzlingly bright in its purity and depth. On 

 the lynches, as the country-folk term the hill- 

 sides, and where the wild orchises abound in 

 the spring-time, the hares love to make their 

 forms. A covey of partridges, rising with 

 much fuss and whirring, sail away across the 

 valley, and flutter down on the spur of a distant 

 hill. At the head of a gorge a pair of kestrels 

 are hovering and circling. As we near the rough, 

 overgrown hedge which serves as a boundary, 

 two magpies (luckily two] dart out, and with 

 quivering tails make off to the fir-copse beyond 

 the gorse-covert which lies below the crest of the 

 opposite hill. 



The contours of the ground are peculiarly in- 



