240 
Hea th. 
‘ ‘ Flower of his dear-loved native land ! 
Alas ! when distant, far more dear! 
When he from cold and foreign strand 
Looks homeward through the blinding tear, 
How must his aching heart deplore 
That home, and thee, he sees no more! ” 
And well may the Highlander value this lovely little blos¬ 
som, for not only does it brighten the bleak hill-sides of his 
mountainous home, but it also supplies many a needed house¬ 
hold deficiency. In olden times it formed an important in¬ 
gredient in his favourite drink, and even now is so used in 
some outlying districts : a fine orange dye is produced from 
its tops, boiled with alum; strong durable ropes are manu¬ 
factured from its fibres; and, though last, not by any means 
least, its warm elastic sprays form a sweet soft bed, whereon 
he may repose his wearied limbs : 
“ Of this, old Scotia’s hardy mountaineers 
Their rustic couches form ; and there enjoy 
Sleep which, beneath his velvet canopy, 
Luxurious idleness implores in vain.” 
Charlotte Smith. 
Well does Withering remark, when speaking of the heath, 
that as the ancients were wont to repose on the leaves of poetic 
trees, not doubting their power of inspiration—as the Agnus 
cactus was fabled to compose the troubled mind, the laurel to 
excite poetic fire, or the bay to suggest martial visions—why 
may not the heather couch equally refresh the weary limbs of 
the rough mountaineer, and awaken noble sentiments in minds 
scarcely less imaginative than those of the ancient Greeks, and 
nothing lacking in credulity ? 
The Highland heath-bed is thus described in Sir Walter 
Scott’s novel of “Rob Roy:” “I remarked that Rob Roy’s 
attention had extended itself to providing us better bedding 
than we had enjoyed the night before. Two of the least fra¬ 
gile of the bedsteads, which stood by the wall of the hut, had 
been stuffed with heath, then in full flower, so artifically ar¬ 
ranged that the flowers, being uppermost, afforded a mattress 
at once elastic and fragrant. Cloaks, and such bedding as 
could be collected, stretched over this vegetable couch, made 
it both soft and warm.” 
The heath has, within the compass of a few years, risen from 
