i 3 2 SUMMER 



the tips of which had made contact with the grasses. Near 

 the tree, as often happens, kexes had gained some supremacy 

 over the grasses. To one looking down the underspace 

 was imbued with a green light of its own, soft and subdued, 

 belonging to another kingdom. As the eye grew used to this 

 light there became obvious a brown patch, which gradually 

 increased in distinctness, till the form and soft hues and bright 

 eye of a hen partridge on her nest stood clearly out. The 

 sun was hot on the field, though the light was low, and further 

 off the bough you could see the purple clover, and the yellow 

 trefoil, and even blue speedwell glinting in the green blades 

 below the waving heads. Looking more minutely you 

 became aware of the numerous little moths that would not 

 face a light so strong as prevailed above the seed-heads, but 

 moved, in preparation for the evening, upon the lower blades. 

 A picture, such as this, of the abundant life and variety of 

 this patch of the world, quite barren a few months ago, for 

 ever raises a hay-field into a great and wonderful world. 



Before hay-cutting and after what a difference in the 

 expression of the country ! The nap has grown over the 

 meadows by the slow gradation that nature loves, at any rate 

 in England. It is shorn in these rapid days within forty-eight 

 hours. The grass lies for a day or two in the level ranks. 

 Then the tedders get to work, tossing it up as the paddle- 

 wheel tosses the water out of its quietude and green colour 

 into tumultuous white. Within a week, if the sun shines hot, 

 as even in England it may do, the hay-field is become quite 

 a lawn, bare and shaved and green. 



No Englishman will deny the beauty of a lawn in this 

 country of lawns. The English downs are lovely lawns, 

 of which the cardinal delight is the short soft smooth 

 grass unbroken in colour, a tapis vert of great dimensions, 

 an old bowling-green for giants, a boulevard in the strict 



