512 



THE NATURE BOOK 



hilly, and well but not continuously 

 wooded. Such a country as Holmes- 

 dale in Surrey, or West Sussex downland. 

 where groves of ancient beech, worn and 

 twisted by a thousand storms, shout 

 across the valley to the pines that fringe 

 the opposite ledge ; deep calling unto deep. 

 There one may traverse long trough-hke 

 hohows running counter to the course of 

 the wind, in almost perfect calm, and hear 

 the continuous pealing of the storm on 

 either height, whilst the low dark clouds 

 hurrying overhead seem like visible em- 

 bodiments of sound. 



But the gale blows itself out ; the wind 

 goes down with the early-setting sun, and 

 as it drops it would seem as though the 

 cloud procession had, at last, come to an 

 end. At the horizon there appears a long 

 window of purest hght, and the effect of 

 this brightness below and gloom above is 

 transfiguring, so that men and beasts, the 

 houses, the trees and the hill slopes, put 

 on a beauty not their own, and look as 

 though they belonged not to this dull, stale 

 earth, but rather to some shining world 

 new made. To such a world as yonder 

 trembling silver sphere, the star of even- 

 ing, that now adds glory to glory in the 

 western sky. 



The night will be serene, and the sky 

 black and set with stars, with frost to- 

 wards morning ; a white frost which 

 begins what may be described as the 

 Halcyon Winter ; a period of calm 

 with clear skies and moderate cold ; 

 gleaming stars at night, and — as though 

 the earth had learnt something of their 

 art of clear shining — in the morning a 

 myriad of star-like sparkles on tree and 

 shrub, on the grass and the bare furrows : 

 a genial warmth prevails at midday, and 

 buds open out in sheltered places on elder 

 and honeysuckle, whilst the missel thrush 

 sings with all his heart ; these summer- 

 like touches are surely Nature's dream- 

 ings, stirrings of Mother Earth in her 

 winter sleep. 



The combined sharpness and brightness 

 of such a time imparts a wonderful purity 

 to earth and air. The ground never 

 looks so clean as when crisped by the white 

 frost : crisp also, and invigorating beyond 

 its wont, is the breath of the morning. 



This for the country ; but these con- 

 ditions of calm and cold often produce 



fog in the streets. A layer of smoky, 

 artificial fog, with an inefficient sun — 

 orange-hued and rayless — dimly visible 

 above the house-tops ; so that a walk into 

 the country in such weather is specially 

 blessed in an atmospheric sense, an 

 exchange of sulphuric acid for ozone. 



Away at the extremity of a south-west 

 suburb the tide of houses is stayed by a 

 noble expanse of common land ; open 

 heath at first, but farther on a broken 

 hilly region, wooded, and intersected 

 with brooks. In the midst is a steep 

 knoll grown over with silver birches, and 

 on a winter morning of sunshine and light 

 frost, the beauty of these trees is almost 

 beyond the possibihty of exaggeration ; 

 and the sight of them to eyes and mind 

 oppressed by the squalor of foggy streets, 

 may be compared in effect to a melody of 

 Mozart played in a workhouse. Their 

 silvery whiteness is brightened to a crystal 

 shining by the hoar frost ; growing one 

 behind and above the other on the steep 

 slope, each tree is suffused in sunshine, 

 and fronts the morning a perfect example 

 of sylvan purity and grace. Standing 

 amongst the trees, and looking upwards, 

 the blue sky gains a deeper intensity 

 from the contrast with the brown hanging 

 tresses, and calm though the air may be — 

 watch— and at a breath, there will be a 

 gentlest swa3'ing of slender stems, a 

 bowing of the cloud-like tops, and a 

 whisper of ecstasy passing from end to 

 end of the grove. 



But January brings a tightening of 

 winter's hold upon the earth : the film of 

 frost becomes a deep crust ; the sky is 

 again possessed by an army of clouds, 

 no longer borne by the mild Atlantic 

 breeze, children of the warm Gulf stream, 

 but frozen vapours of the North, leaden- 

 winged messengers from Lapland or 

 Siberia. 



Midsummer to midwinter ! It is not 

 possible for us to realise the world of 

 difference that exists between the two 

 conditions, for no effort of memory or 

 exercise of imagination can bring the 

 two pictures side b}- side. An old fable 

 tells of a wizard who showed to a Northern 

 king, from the four windows of a room, 

 the four seasons in their prime ; but until 

 that wizard returns we cannot know, in 

 the poverty of winter, what a wealth of 



