152 NA TURE NO TES. 
hover over the flower beds, and generally make the best of the 
mid-day warmth. 
Even when, towards the end of the month, the trees grow 
barer and are finally stripped of their foliage, a new interest 
arises in the study of their ramification. Each tree is as distinct 
in the character of its branching as in the form of its leaves, and 
an oak, a beech, an ash, or an elm, are as recognisable in January 
as in July. 
An old writer declares that “he who in all things eyes a 
Providence shall never lack a Providence to eye,” and we may 
say equally that he who goes out to seek interest and beauty 
in nature shall never fail in his quest. As the year travels its 
appointed round each recurring season brings with it interest 
and beauty of its Own. 
“Could we but open and intend our eyes 
AYe each, like Moses, should espy 
E’en in a bush the radiant Deity.” 
The commonest weed contains within itself enough study for 
a lifetime, and is an epitome of all the laws of plant-growth, an 
autograph from the hand of the Creator, and as perfect in its. 
fitness for its work, and in its obedience to law, as the mighty 
planets circling through infinite space. All times, all places, 
contain abundant evidence of Divine wisdom, and even the 
pebble at our feet, could we but unlock all the history wrapped 
up in it, would carry us back to the childhood of the world, and 
reveal to us mighty changes in progress some few millions of 
3’ears before the sons of men sprang into existence at all. Those 
who wander forth and find nothing to interest them, owe the 
loss not to nature but to themselves, while the love of nature is 
one of the most lasting of pleasures. In fifty years one's tastes 
change in many ways, and of the things that fascinated at the 
beginning few remain unimpaired at the end of that period ; but 
an appreciative love and study of nature only deepens as time 
goes on, and an interest once developed in this direction is 
ordinarily a possession that endures and brightens the whole 
life. 
F. E. Hulme. 
“ RESTORATION.” 
[We have much pleasure in printing the following letter from 
Mr. Thackeray Turner, who has done so much good work as 
Secretary of the Society for the Preservation of Ancient Build- 
ings. In the programme of Nature Notes we referred to this 
Society as being “ in spirit closely akin to our own. We have 
the same foes to contend with, and many tastes in common. 
The man who loves every stone of the old abbey, beautiful even 
in its ruins, and reverently garners the legends of its ancient fame,. 
