294 
STUMBLES AND BAY LEAVES. 
long ago, in the days of good king David, upon the 
sunny slopes of Palestine; and although you have not 
the pencil of a Morland, a Wilson, or a Collins, such a 
picture is painted for ever on the living canvas of your 
heart. As you turn off into the narrow by-path, to see 
whereabout the village church is hiding itself, you come 
upon a picture which every artist has tried his hand at. 
A quiet pond, overgrown with duckweeds and bulrushes, 
with a group of cattle of white, russet, and grey, loiter¬ 
ing about in the most picturesque positions, the cows 
looking particularly motherly and stupid, and all of them 
flickering their tails about to drive away the swarms of 
insects which annoy them. There are two or three old 
pollard-willows, and an oak tree, with neither head nor 
limbs, stands staggering at the brink in a half horizontal 
position, as if he contemplated suicide by drowning his 
body; he is covered all over with scars, and wounds, 
and blotches, which tell most significantly of the many 
affrays he has had with the midnight-winds, and the 
north-east blasts of January. If you come here next 
summer you shall find him leaning over the water in the 
same melancholy pondering mood, shaking a few green 
leaves in the wind, just to divert the attention of 
passers-by from the deed he is evidently contemplating; 
and it will be many summers before he will resign 
himself to his fate. There will be one mourner in that 
solitary ass, standing not far off, as immoveable as a 
petrifaction. 
The fields around wear the promise of plenty; the 
rye has a yellow and a hearty look, the horned barley 
makes a rustling sound, as the soft wind sweeps gently 
