32 THE OPEN AIR. 



shine like the sands under the liquid sea, no harsh- 

 ness of man-made sound to break the insulation amid 

 nature, on an island in a far Pacific of sunshine. 

 Some people would hesitate to walk down the stair- 

 case cut in the turf to the beech-trees beneath ; the 

 woods look so small beneath, so far down and steep, 

 and no handrail. Many go to the Dyke, but none to 

 Wolstanbury Hill. To come over the range reminds 

 one of what travellers say of coming over the Alps 

 into Italy ; from harsh sea-slopes, made dry with salt 

 as they sow salt on razed cities that naught may 

 grow, to warm plains rich in all things, and with 

 great hills as pictures hung on a wall to gaze at. 

 Where there are beech-trees the land is always 

 beautiful ; beech-trees at the foot of this hill, beech- 

 trees at Arundel in that lovely park which the Duke 

 of Norfolk, to his glory, leaves open to all the world, 

 and where the anemones flourish in unusual size and 

 number ; beech-trees in Marlborough Forest ; beech- 

 trees at the summit to which the lane leads that was 

 spoken of just now. Beech and beautiful scenery go 

 together. 



But the primroses by that lane did not appear till 

 late; they covered the banks under the thousand 

 thousand ash-poles; foxes slipped along there fre- 

 quently, whose friends in scarlet coats could not 

 endure the pale flowers, for they might chink their 

 spurs homewards. In one meadow near primroses 

 were thicker than the grass, with gorse interspersed, 

 and the rabbits that came out fed among flowers. 

 The primroses last on to the celandines and cowslips, 

 through the time of the bluebells, past the violets 



