252 



THE NATURE BOOK 



gathered up and expressed in this per- even the primal imposition of labour 



feet stillness of the wheat - field : the 



summer Hush of the Corn. 



***** 



Out on the Upland, the August heat 

 of the sun, great as it is, serves in no 



proving a blessing rather than a curse. 



But the cultivation of the wheat, easy 

 as it is to us who enter into the labour 

 of others, must have had a hard enough 

 beginning. 



IHK TIMK Ob HAKVhSl. 



wise to oppress, but rather to inspire 

 and hearten : the fire which has burnt 

 through the wrappings of the sunflower, 

 and made of its ripening breast a mirror 

 for its own glory ; which has kindled the 

 hollyhocks of the garden into living 

 torches, and cast the harmless brands of 

 the poppies amongst the corn, seems to 

 shine with happiness widespread as its 

 light, and to make the glowing air a very 

 elixir of life. 



Looking at the long rows of stooks 

 (" aisles " we call them in euphonious 

 Wessex), and at the busy clusters of 

 men and women about the wagons in 

 the field, the thought comes that if only 

 men could be persuaded to live by bread 

 alone — content to satisfy their hunger 

 and starve their lusts — how easy and 

 pleasant a thing life might be made ; 



All around the field grow the grasses, 

 now dry and seeded, the poor relations 

 and ancestors of the corn — oat grass, rye 

 grass ; their names and appearance are 

 sufficiently suggestive, and we hardly 

 need the botanists to tell us that from 

 one of the humble tribes of these grasses 

 the noble family of the grain has sprung. 

 How we plume ourselves to-day on the 

 skill shown by our gardeners in produc- 

 ing new and strange varieties of fruits 

 and flowers : turning chrysanthemums 

 into dahlias, dyeing the sweet la\'ender 

 of the scabious with a lurid crimson, 

 and producing weird hybrid fruits, 

 neither blackberry, currant, nor good 

 green gooseberry. But what are these 

 trium})hs of to-day compared with this 

 work, done long ages before the dawn 

 of history : this turning of tares into 



