THE CLANS OF THE GRASS 



OF all the miracles of the green world none 

 surpasses that of the grass. It has many 

 names, many raiments even, but it is always 

 that wonderful thing which the poets of all 

 time have delighted in calling the green hair 

 of earth. * Soft green hair of the rocks,' says 

 a Breton poet. Another Celtic poet has used 

 the word alike for the mosses which clothe 

 the talons of old trees and for the forests 

 themselves. No fantastic hyperbole this : 

 from a great height forests of pine and oak 

 seem like reaches of sombre grass. To the 

 shrewmouse the tall grasses of June are green 

 woods, and the slim stems of the reddening 

 sorrels are groves of pinetrees. I remember 

 having read somewhere of a lovely name given 

 to the grass by the Arabs of the desert . . . 

 * the Bride of Mahomet.' What lovelier and 

 more gracious thing in the world, in their 

 eyes, than this soft cool greenness of the oasis, 

 26 



