THE ABUSE AND PROTECTION OF ALPINES 131 



in this regard. More often than not the flowers are 

 far better cared for by the tourist who is utterly 

 indifferent to their charms : for he leaves them 

 alone ! Oh that all flowers had the traditional gift 

 of Atropa Mandr agora (the Mandrake) to shriek 

 out aloud when pulled up by the roots ! The cry 

 might affect to good purpose the ' disorderly ' 

 flower-lover ! Seemingly, like the proverbial boy 

 who must fling a murderous stone at any beautiful 

 bird, the tourist, as soon as he sees a lovely flower 

 some particularly well-grown specimen or some 

 rare white form is apt to feel that it must be 

 uprooted and taken home. The same idle impulse 

 the impulse to possess, and the impulse to kill in 

 order to possess seizes boy and tourist alike, and 

 usually with a like result : the bird is 'soon thrown 

 aside to moulder, whilst the plant is left to rot 

 in water or to lie waterless in the sun on the 

 window-sill of some hotel bedroom. The reckless 

 and destructive element in this impulse to possess 

 6 root and branch ' was strikingly illustrated in the 

 early summer of 1908. During a ten-days absence 

 of the gardener, a number of lovely Alpines were 

 uprooted from the garden on the summit of the 

 Rochers de Naye, above Montreux, many of the 

 plants being left lying scattered here and there, 



