THROUGH FIRS AND HEATHER. 287 



digression. We have mentioned the huge mounds 

 that jut out like buttresses from the hillsides. 

 There is one near to the cottage where I stay. On 

 reaching the base of it from the moor road, we find 

 a gate in the thicket that is at the bottom, which 

 leads to what looks like a bridle-path running 

 through the stunted firs and birches. Slender- 

 stemmed oaks are scattered about, but they are not 

 numerous. The soil here consists of sand of vari- 

 ous tones of colouring, from buff to silver, with 

 dark peat-mould in some places. This has appar- 

 ently been washed down from the top of the mound, 

 for small rills are running from the top to the bot- 

 tom in all directions. So slight is the covering of 

 leaf-mould in some places, that we lift the mosses 

 and stunted heath clean off the loamy gravel mixed 

 with sand, just like lifting a carpet off a floor, and 

 lay it down again. Delightful, indeed, it is, wan- 

 dering about here ; for paths, or rather tracks, run 

 in all directions, up and down and round the hill 

 or mound. The glass shows us hollows sparkling 

 with the first shoots of bog-vegetation, overhung by 

 slender birches, which are perched here, as we after- 

 wards find they are throughout the whole district, 



