158 GREAT BINDWEED. 



ness are apparent; tokens upon the bleak 

 hill's-sicle, even in chill winter, that beauty 

 is ready to burst forth ; Mountain gorses 

 teaching as from an academic chair, cano- 

 pied with the blue heavens,* that, although 

 placed high, they shun not to live low upon 

 the ground to shelter many a sweet songster 

 that soars from amid their thorny citadels 

 to bear his song towards the rising sun ; 

 or, perchance, the timid leveret or the conies, 

 feeble folks, which have no other hiding- 

 places ; mountain gorses resembling those 

 holy men who sit in heavenly places as 

 beacons to the world, being seen from far, 

 yet disdain not to mingle with the lowly, 

 and give shelter to many a weak and feeble 

 one, who have no song with which to thank 

 them. 



But the convolvulus has a different sta- 



* Vide Miss Barrett's beautiful lines to the Mountain 

 Gorse, " Poems," vol. ii. p. 281. 



