12 BRITISH MOSSES. 



like a veil over all ; and the half-unfolded, transparent oak-leaves made the trees 

 seem dropping gold ; and the birds sang and sang, and stopped a little, and burst 

 forth again, and hushed ; and one thrush took up the strain, and ceased ; and the 

 cuckoo cried from the depths of the wood, " Spring's here ! Spring's here ! " 



The north-western part of Hampshire is formed by a district of high table- 

 land ; it is full of wild bits of country called " commons," vast thickets with trees 

 standing up amongst them, the purple and red of whose fallen leaves make, with 

 the green mosses, colouring which is beautiful exceedingly. We entered once 

 upon a common from a bare flat, whence we passed under the shadow of the 

 beech trees ; the ground slopes away ; the beech trees stand in regular rows along- 

 on the hill-side, their roots forming terraces covered with short spare turf ; but 

 immediately at their feet are spread cushions of green star-mosses, with little 

 capped heads, and sometimes, for the whole space between two trees, the ground 

 will be covered with stars set close together like a nebula of moss, and then the 

 nebula will be lost in the turf which comes in the open ground. It is, perhaps, 

 the almost entire absence of other vegetation which gives a beech-wood shade its 

 peculiar character of absolute quiet; and this beech wood in particular is still. 

 The great limbs of the trees are untouched, the light clouds of their young foliage 

 are undisturbed, the mossy carpet is undented by a foot-mark. Passing on into 

 the shade, and descending the terraces step by step, a long avenue opens ; the 

 beechen giants stand up at regular distances, behind them, on each side, are rows 

 of younger trees, whose trunks are at as even distances as cathedral pillars, and 

 the long silvery perspective reaches two miles away ; between the pillars is the 

 smooth floor of turf, and the smoothness is more smooth, and the regularity more 

 regular, because the beech avenue divides a dense, wild thicket, above which, a 

 green island from the sea, rises here and there a holly or a piue. Strange, 

 enchanted like it is, to come from the still wood out into the length of the avenue, 

 and see, far away upon the turf, the wind whirling round a handful of dead leaves 

 in wild and mystic dance. 



We have said that it is the condensed vapour in the Cornish valleys which 

 makes the climate so favourable for the growth of the moss ; and the coming in of the 

 vapour from the sea is often a wonderful sight. The cloudless blue sky is suddenly 

 overcast by a thick mist, so impenetrable that nothing can be seen through it ; as 

 suddenly, while the thick grey gives a curious impression that you are " no where," 



