IN STORM AND SHINE 51 



of the nature of cheese, so are these Alpines the 

 wonderful things they are because of the nature 

 of the conditions with which they have to contend 

 and upon which they have to subsist. It is all 

 very well for us to arrive upon the scene at this 

 late moment in their existence, transplant them to 

 our gardens, and there grow them, maybe, with 

 marked success ; it is all very well for us to annex 

 them now to our retinue of chattels, lord it over 

 them, and display them on our rockworks as if it 

 were to us and to our care and trouble that they 

 owe their beauty ; but these plants have arrived at 

 what they are without us and our attentions. Our 

 gardens never made them what they are, or gave 

 them one particle of their supreme and striking 

 beauty. Nor are our gardens likely to heighten 

 that beauty in any real way ; much more likely 

 is it that we shall arrive at degrading their refine- 

 ment by bringing it down from the severe purity 

 of the skies to the grosser, easier circumstance of 

 our sheltered soil. 



Alpine plants, perhaps because of the extreme 

 conditions with which they have to contend, and 

 therefore because of the extreme measures they 

 have to take in order to defend themselves, seem 

 to be possessed of an efficiency surpassing that 



