In My Vicarage Garden 



that such a flower could have escaped the notice 

 of all our old writers. How could Shakespeare 

 have missed it, if it was as abundant in his time 

 in Warwickshire as it is now? He must have 

 named it, if he had ever seen it in rivers, 

 as one of Ophelia's flowers, or even as one 

 that 



" Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay 

 To muddy death." 



Or how could Isaak Walton have overlooked it 

 when he was writing so lovingly of rivers and of 

 everything that lived in them ? 



I come back to the question with which I 

 started. What difference would a Briton who 

 lived in A.D. lOO find in the natural scenery of 

 England if he could re-visit it? He would find 

 many difi"erences, at first sight a great many ; but 

 a closer view would show him that though there 

 were many additions, the Britain of the nineteenth 

 century was not so very unlike the Britain of the 

 first, and he would soon recognise many well- 

 known and familiar features in the scenery, the 

 animals, and the plants. How would it be with 

 the inhabitants ? Would he recognise as his 

 family descendants the Englishmen of the present 

 day, changed as they must have been by admix- 

 ture with Roman, Danish, Saxon, and Norman 

 parents ? I think with a little trouble he might. 

 And to go deeper still, would he recognise in the 

 present moral character of Englishmen any re- 

 172 



