84 REV. F. A. WALKER, D.D., F.L.S., 
realised by all the foliage being turned to the brightest red, 
resulting in dazzled and aching eyes, and convincing her that 
no tint in Nature was so productive as the green of springtide 
of softness and repose, and so unattended by inconvenience. 
It may be remarked, en passant, concerning scarlet, that very 
few of our English wild flowers are of this colour,—the field 
poppy and the pimpernel, for example; but the field poppy is 
the only one of sufficient size and occurring in sufficient 
quantity to create a noticeable feature in the landscape, 
wherever it fills the cornfields. A much larger proportion are 
pink or crimson, as the foxglove, the lychnis, the bloody 
crane’s-bill, the willow herb, the herb Robert, the lythrum, 
common mallow, ragged robin, clover, &c. It is very possible 
that the ferruginous character of the soil in places may contri- 
bute to the abundant number or to the intensity in hue of 
several crimson flowering plants. And similarly different 
chemical agencies are rendered subservient to the production 
every season of variations in colour in cultivated kinds. It 
may be observed with regard to butterflies, as a parallel to 
what has been above stated, that very few species indeed are 
entirely scarlet or red,—Harma sangaris of West Africa, and 
Appias nero of Hast Indies, furnishing two notable exceptions ; 
but in almost every other instance the red does not constitute 
the only, or even the ground colour, but occurs in spots or 
patches. 
Among birds also, and to take the parrot tribe as a ser- 
viceable example, there are more green than red kinds, 
though in the case of butterflies and moths there are few 
species entirely green like the African Charazes eupale among 
butterflies and the “ Emeralds ” among British moths. And 
in British plants Helleborus viridis, or green hellebore, is one 
of the very few conspicuous kinds that have an apple-green 
flower similar in tint to an ordinary leaf. To blue, on the 
contrary, has been assigned a far larger place among the 
works of creation. 
“Blue rolls the waters, blue the sky 
Shines like an ocean hung on high.” 
Blue is the colour of Virgil’s thundercloud :-— 
“ Olli cceruleus supra caput astitit imber, 
Noctem hiememque ferens.” 
The heavens declare the glory of God, and when we assert 
of any object of Nature that it is sky-blue, we are purposely 
ascribing to it the most lovely tint of all imaginable hues. 
When, in Exodus xxiy., Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, 
