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NATURE FOR ITS OWN SAKE 



make one brilliant. The buttercup absorbs and 

 practically annihilates green, red, blue, orange, 

 violet ; all these pass into the petals and are 

 lost. Yellow alone it rejects and reflects, just 

 as the violet throws back violet and the pink 

 throws back pink. The white petal of the 

 daisy, more imperious than the others, rejects 

 all the hues and remains white or colorless ; 

 and there is a dark, bell-shaped wild-flower (its 

 name I have never known) which absorbs all 

 the hues and remains nearly black or colorless 

 again. Yet with this enormous destruction 

 of color that goes on, year in and year out the 

 whole world round, nature never seems to want. 

 To-day each woven thread of gold, silver, scar- 

 let, or purple in her variegated garment throws 

 off its light as brilliantly as in pre-Adamite 



And how often the garment changes ! Con- 

 sider how many new robes the pasture-lot has 

 in the course of the year all of them bright 

 and beautiful ! There is the tender, yellow- 

 green grass of early spring, which soon changes 

 to dark green and is dotted with golden dande- 

 lions. When the dandelions have passed, the 

 whole field turns yellow with buttercups, and is 

 then blown white with daisies. In September 



