88 MOUNTAIN AND MOORLAND 



The Common Ling, or True Heather, may be 

 known at once from the Heaths, or Bell Heathers, by 

 having much smaller and more numerous flowers, in 

 which the calyx is longer than the corolla and both 

 are coloured rosy-purple, sometimes varying to white. 

 The leaves are very minute. The Heath, or Bell 

 Heather, has fewer but finer and larger bell-shaped 

 flowers, with the calyx not coloured. Its leaves, 

 though small, are larger than in the Ling. The Fine- 

 leaved Heath (Erica cinerea) has its crimson-purple 

 flowers in whorls at different levels up the stem; it is 

 smooth and dark green. The Cross-leaved Heath 

 (Erica tetralix) has all its rose-red flowers in a droop- 

 ing bunch at the top of the stem, and is typically 

 downy and grey. In Heather as well as in Heath the 

 calyx and corolla dry without crumpling up, and keep 

 their shape, as everyone knows, through the winter. 

 We have not in these studies troubled with distinc- 

 tions between kinds, and in a sense it matters little 

 whether one calls a plant Heather or Heath, Ling or 

 Bell Heather, Calluna or Erica. What does matter is 

 that we see the differences between two very common 

 and very characteristic plants. Just as there are two 

 great kinds of mountains, so there are two kinds of 

 heather plants on these mountains, and unless we are 

 to be content with the blurred vision which seems to 

 be all that moles can have, we should make up our 

 minds to know the one kind from the other. It is 

 easier for the Heathers than for the mountains. This 

 sort of question may be profitably followed up in a 

 book like Step's "Wild Flowers Month by Month" 

 (2 vols., 1906) and in Hooker's " Students' Flora." 



But the important question is, why Heather should 



