170 FLOWER-FIELDS OF ALPINE SWITZERLAND 



feature of an Alpine field. The ground should 

 rise towards them and should be of a poorer 

 nature than where the grass is to be really 

 meadowy ; for upon the poorer ground we shall 

 be dependent for many colonies of gay and 

 interesting plants which would be out of place, 

 even they could exist, among the thicker grasses. 

 Here we may count upon brilliance long after 

 the Geranium and its field-consorts have been 

 mown down — brilliance afforded by such subjects 

 as Ononis natrix^ Linuvi tenuifolium, L. alpinum, 

 Jasione montana, Campanula spicata C. barbata, 

 C. persicifolia, Trifolium alpinum, Eryngium 

 alpinum, Vicia onobrychioides, Veronica urticce- 

 folia, Lathyrus heterophyllus, Anthyllis vulneraria. 

 Car dims dejloratus, Verbascuni phlovioides, and 

 Onobrycliis vicicefolia, the rosy Sainfoin or " whole- 

 some hay," for which the ass is said to bray. 



The rocks employed ought, in greater part, 

 to be of a "generous" nature, not hard and un- 

 responsive. They should if possible be even soft 

 (as rocks go) and somewhat liable to disintegration 

 — rocks upon which, with a little preliminary 

 encouragement, Sedums, Dianthus, and Semper- 

 vivums can take root. They ought not to be 

 built up to form what is generally recognised as 



