CONCERNING LAWNS 351 
drifted away; then indeed he will recover his 
power, and slowly, patiently, unhasting and un- 
resting, day and night, year by year, century 
after century, he will labour to sink away brick 
and stone beneath the surface and cover it all with 
a deep rich mould and a mantle of everlasting 
verdure. 
Then we have the earthworms inhabiting heaths 
and all sandy soils throughout the land. They are 
no better than the London earthworms. One day 
last autumn I found the gardener at the house in 
a pine wood where I was staying at Ascot digging 
potatoes. I took a spade and went to him and 
started digging for worms at his side. There was 
a magnificent crop of potatoes, as it has been 
everywhere this autumn of 1918, but the earth- 
worms we turned up were few in number and very 
poor specimens. “It is useless,” said the gardener, 
“to look for a big worm here—I never see one. It 
is the sand that starves them.” 
I am not sure that this is a sufficient explana- 
tion: in the rich soils in these highly cultivated 
gardens in this heath and pine district where 
wealthy people have their homes, the worms, one 
would think, must find sufficient nourishment. It 
is more probable that their poor condition is due 
to something inimical to earthworms in the sand 
itself, 
On the chalk, where the soil is thin, as in the 
sheep-walks, the earthworms are comparatively 
small in size, but vigorous and quick in their move- 
