SOME EARLY FLOWERS 285 



not suspect that he has any designs on her nor feel 

 any sense of awe or strangeness to make her silent or 

 awkward. She talks to him as naturally as to one of 

 her own class. It is this common bond between 

 people which one finds a relief and pleasure when 

 going from an English, or an Anglo-Saxon, county to 

 Cornwall and which made it pleasant to me to walk 

 with this homely commonplace peasant girl. 



But when I talked to her about the flowers growing 

 in profusion by the hedge-side and along the borders 

 of the path she assured me that she never looked 

 at them and knew nothing about them. Well, 

 yes, she did know three or four wild flowers by 

 their names. 



"But surely," I said, "you must know these that are 

 so common these little blue flowers, for instance, what 

 do you call them ? " and I plucked a spray of speed- 

 well. She said they were violets, and when I picked 

 a violet and pointed out the difference in shape and 

 size and colour she agreed that they were a little un- 

 like when you looked at them, " but," she said, " we 

 never look at them and we call all these little blue ones 

 violets." "But," I persisted, "flowers are the most 

 beautiful things on the earth and we all love and admire 

 them and are glad to see them again in spring surely 

 you must know something more than you say about 

 them you must have been accustomed to gather them 

 in your childhood." But she would not have it. "We 

 never take notice of wild flowers," she said ; "they are 

 no use and we call them all violets all these blue 

 ones." And she pointed to the hedge-side, where there 



