Candlemas to Lammas 
Autumn Bells is a pretty old name in England for this 
last, but bouquets of these are disappointing, as the flowers 
close when in water. Yet the tints of plants found on 
mountain soil are so much more vivid in colouring than 
those of the same kind of plants at lower altitudes, that one 
is tempted to pick in spite of oneself. Beautiful, however, 
as is the Gentian, I have not come across much praise ot 
it by the poets, though William Cullen Bryant sang of the 
“ fringed gentian’s sweet and quiet eye.” There is a 
splendid tall yellow Gentian which grows freely on the 
higher pastures, and looks very handsome both when in 
flower and in seed — G. lutea. It is, I believe, used in 
commerce as the “tonic gentian.” Fellwort (or Mountain 
Plant) was the English name in use in Queen Anne’s days ; 
the term “ fell” still lingers on the Scottish border and in 
the British Lake Country, and an old Scottish name for 
Birdsfoot Trefoil ( Lotos comiculata ) used to be Fellbroom. 
Crawtaes is its more recent Scotch name, also Catsclaws. 
Milton also called it Crowtoes. Crowtoes is sometimes 
applied to Bluebells. 
In the Rose season Cabbage-roses grow in every pea- 
sant’s untidy patch of garden and by every evil-smelling 
crassly dirty hovel, and well do I remember a withered old 
“ alte Hexel” of a woman who always came after me with 
her basket full of sweet temptation, once she discovered we 
could not resist buying of her daily, to make potpourri, 
since Cabbage-rose leaves are the best for that delectable 
mixture. Indeed, once she nearly came to blows with 
another old white-capped wife, who had been beforehand 
in offering us her Roses. I found in my old man’s garden 
different kinds of Mountain Pinks — Sylvaticus Ccesius, &c. 
— Saxifrages and Martagon lilies, Astrantia, and a lovely 
yellow-flowered Aconite ; also a curious feathery-green 
plant called Cerfeuille musquee , or musk-scented Fennel, 
very graceful and suitable for a wild garden, but requiring 
a good deal of elbow-room, as it spreads into a great bush. 
I shall take specimens of all these away to Scotland and 
try them in my garden. In the meadows the giant globe- 
8 S 
