CHAPTER II 



ALPINE FI.OWER-IIELDS 



" If you go to the open field^ you shall always be in contact directly 

 with the Nature. You hear how sweetly those innocent birds are 

 singing. You see how beautifully those meadow-flowers are blossom- 

 ing. . . . Everything you are observing tliere is pure and sacred. 

 And you yourselves are unconsciously converted into purity by the 

 Nature." — Yoshio Markino^ My Mealed John Bulless. 



Alpine Floaver-fields ; it is well that we should 

 at once come to some understanding as to the 

 term " Alpine " and what it is here intended to 

 convey, otherwise it will be open to misinterpre- 

 tation. Purists in the use of words will be nearer 

 to our present meaning than they who have in 

 mind the modern and general acceptation of the 

 words " Alp " and " Alpine." The authority of 

 custom has confirmed these words in what, really, 

 is faulty usage. " Alp " really means a mountain 

 pastiu-age, and its original use, traceable for more 

 than a thousand years, relates to any part of a 

 mountain where the cattle can graze. It does 



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