2st 
NATURE FOR ITS OWN SAKE 
Meadow- 
flowers. 
Pasture- 
changes. 
make one brilliant. The buttercup absorbs and 
practically annihilates green, red, blue, orange, 
violet; all these pass into the petals and are 
lost. Yellow alone it rejects and reflects, just 
as the violet throws back violet and the pink 
throws back pink. The white petal of the 
daisy, more imperious than the others, rejects 
all the hues and remains white or colorless ; 
and there is a dark, bell-shaped wild-flower (its 
name I have never known) which absorbs all 
the hues and remains nearly black or colorless 
again, Yet with this enormous destruction 
of color that goes on, year in and year out the 
whole world round, nature never seems to want. 
To-day each woven thread of gold, silver, scar- 
let, or purple in her variegated garment throws 
off its light as brilliantly as in pre-Adamite 
days. 
And how often the garment changes! Con- 
sider how many new robes the pasture-lot has 
in the course of the year—all of them bright 
and beautiful! There is the tender, yellow- 
green grass of early spring, which soon changes 
to dark green and is dotted with golden dande- 
lions. When the dandelions have passed, the 
whole field turns yellow with buttercups, and is 
then blown white with daisies. In September 
