VII. THE PARABLE OF JOTHAM. 133 



many a year before it became mine. I had to 

 cut my way into it through a mass of thorny 

 ruin ; black, bird's-nest like, entanglement of brittle 

 spray round twisted stems of ill-grown birches 

 strangling each other, and changing half into 

 roots among the rock clefts ; knotted stumps of 

 never-blossoming blackthorn, and choked strag- 

 glings of holly, all laced and twisted and tethered 

 round with an untouchable, almost unhewable, 

 thatch, a foot thick, of dead bramble and rose, 

 laid over rotten ground through which the water 

 soaked ceaselessly, undermining it into merely 

 unctuous clods and clots, knitted together by 

 mossy sponge. It was all Nature's free doing ! 

 she had had her way with it to the uttermost ; 

 and clearly needed human help and interference 

 in her business ; and yet there was not one 

 plant in the whole ruinous and deathful riot of 

 the place, whose nature was not in itself whole- 

 some and lovely ; but all lost for want of disci- 

 pline. 



5. The other piece of wild growth was among 

 the fallen blocks of limestone under Malham Cove. 

 Sheltered by the cliff above from stress of wind, 

 the ash and hazel wood spring there in a fair 

 and perfect freedom, without a diseased bough, or 

 an unwholesome shade. I do not know why mine 



