A SUMMER STROLL. 



Alas, that it should have conceived at so 

 early an age so justly unfavourable an idea 

 of humanity ! 



Beyond the plantation we turned aside 

 into a field, and oh ! such a field ! Have I 

 words to picture it ? It had been sown 

 for grass ; but no grass was there. " Bad 

 season," says the farmer. " Thank Heaven 

 for these slovenly farms," says the botanist. 

 Blue cornflowers grew in it, thick as stars 

 in heaven ; and huge spikes of viper's 

 bugloss as tall as a man's waist and more 

 lovely than a turquoise. Who shall de- 

 scribe their hue, their form, their fashion ? 

 A great spotted stem, like a lizard's skin, 

 green flecked with russet brown, and un- 

 canny to look upon ; on either side, long 

 twisted spirals of red-and-blue blossoms, 

 each curled like a scorpion's tail, very strange 

 and lurid. The individual blossom is bright 

 blue, when fully opened, with crimson sta- 

 mens ; the buds are deep red ; the dead 

 flowers dry violet. Altogether, a most 

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