THE FLOWERY WAY 125 



" golds," " drunkards," " meadow-routs," and, lastly, 

 " hobble-bobbles." 



Coming up the lane, for we have now topped the 

 hill, and are descending again, are two little girls 

 carrying bunches of bitter-cress or cuckoo-flowers ; 

 but we decide not to know our old friends, so ask for 

 and get the name of " milk-maids." It is a good 

 name. Better, perhaps, than " ladies'-smocks." They 

 are milk-maids in very pale lilac dresses, or some- 

 times in white, for the flower has many hues. But 

 the palest of them will appear pink beside the stitch- 

 wort, which is now pushing up the characteristic 

 knotted stems of the pink family all along the hedges, 

 which it will soon star all over with dazzling white. 

 Everything, even the white campions that the mid- 

 summer moths love so well, must yield in brilliance 

 and purity to the " snow in summer." 



We do not think there is a prettier plant of the 

 lanes than wood-sorrel. We have not seen it in 

 such profusion in any other lane than this, for it 

 usually preserves its name by growing haphazard in 

 the woods. But here it is all along the banks by the 

 roadside, and in great profusion. In tenderest green, 

 the trefoil leaves tempt us to know again the sweet 

 sharpness of " cuckoo's meat," but the thousands of 

 bell-like flowers move the soul to less carnal feelings. 

 Why should this white flower vein itself so delicately, 

 with scarcely perceptible purple ? It is one of the 

 gratuities of floral excellence, not to be ascribed by 

 any means to sordid struggle. No bee has demanded 

 such an embellishment, no animal is warned off by 

 it. Possibly it has to do with the excessive thinness 

 of the petals, or it may be that the wood-sorrel has 



