54 COUNTRY ESSAYS. 



thinks how fitly heath should grow over a man whose life'was 

 never dissociated from its present spell whose greatest delight 

 it was to tread the heather braes, and hear the wild bee 

 murmur in its purple masses. And then the clouds break in 

 a soft deluge that overwhelms day, and, with another lover of 

 Scotland, the gathered sprig of heather, hastily thrust into the 

 pocket, may become a memorial of sober thoughts with which 

 Nature in her present mood appears to sympathise. The pale, 

 shrivelled blossoms, seen after many days, may haply blossom 

 afresh in high aspirations, the parents of noble deeds, linked to 

 them by some mysterious connection with the solemn spectacle 

 and accompanying reflections during which they were gathered. 

 For association, as we have striven to show, has wondrous 

 power ; and sentiment is very far from being a weak incentive 

 to goodness, and heather suggests many pleasant reminiscences 

 to those who mentally connect it with a long series of autumnal 

 rambles. If the ancients (as its scientific name Erica shows) 

 regarded heather as a natural substitute for lithotrity, much 

 more wisely do we deem it a symbol of happy rest and 

 recreation. 



