THE LAP OF PROSERPINE 121 



near five hundred will be found to flourish in such 

 spots as these I name — a number exceeding one- 

 quarter of the total British flora. As for the whole 

 county, embracing its shores and high hills, water 

 meadows, river margins, estuaries and lone waste 

 places, you shall find therein above half of the in- 

 digenous flowering plants of the kingdom. 



In May life breaks loose, and no chronicler can tell 

 more than a fraction of the story of the lanes. Every- 

 where is the crisp chirrup of new-born birds, from 

 the pigeon's two or three downy young, perilously 

 perched on the fir in roughest fabric — a twig be- 

 tween them and death — to the eight or ten atoms of 

 life, all eyes, in a wren's home. There is ceaseless 

 industry, and brave work of grub-hunting and fly- 

 catching. 



The cuckoo-flower's faint lavender is by the pond, 

 the herb-robert and the shining crane's-bill, the rosy 

 campion and the mallow flush the way ; and, aloft, the 

 hawthorn breaks its round buds above the tiny forget- 

 me-not, that is born yellow and dies blue ; above the 

 brightness of the greater celandine, and the spotted 

 orange and scarlet of the "archangels," and white dead 

 nettles, and the tangle and triumphant upspringing of 

 the grasses. There are a few sedges also here, and, 

 by the pond, various of the more common rushes swell 

 and break for flowers. The maple leaves are most deli- 

 cate, diaphanous, and beautiful at this season, and the 

 crab-apple's clustered blossoms, all pink and white, 

 with lemon anthers, peep aloft. Elsewhere, the way- 



