HAMPSHIRE DAYS 



distance at which to view the blossoming plants; not 

 indeed as a plant-student or an admirer of flowers 

 in a garden would view it, as the one thing to see, 

 but merely as part of the scene. The colour is then 

 everything. There is no purer, no more beautiful 

 yellow on any of our wild flowers, from the primrose 

 and the almost equally pale, exquisite blossom which 

 we improperly name "dark mullein" in our books 

 on account of its lovely purple eye, to the intensest 

 pure yellow of the marsh marigold. 



But although purity of colour is the chief thing, 

 it would not of itself serve to give so great a dis- 

 tinction to this plant ; the charm is in the colour 

 and the way in which Nature has disposed it, abun- 

 dantly, in single, separate blossoms, among leaves of 

 a green that is rich and beautiful, and looks almost 

 dark by contrast with that shining, luminous hue it 

 sets off so well. 



On September 17 it was Harvest Festival Sunday 

 at the little church at Itchen Abbas, where I wor- 

 shipped that day, and I noticed that the decorators 

 had dressed up the font with water-plants and flowers 

 from the river ; reeds and reed-mace, or cat's- tail, 

 and the yellow mimulus. It was a mistake. Deep 

 green, glossy foliage, and white and brilliantly coloured 

 flowers look well in churches ; white chrysanthemums, 

 arums, azaleas, and other conspicuous white flowers; 

 and scarlet geraniums, and many other garden blooms 

 which seen in masses in the sunshine hurt the sense 



