Edward Step

“ Yet how few are acquainted with its flowers!
There is no occasion to say that the Ivy is an evergreen perennial climbing shrub, nor to describe the form of the beautiful leathery leaf. If there is one leaf that may be said to be thoroughly well known to every British man, woman, and child, it must be the Ivy, for it thrives in dark corners of towns as well as on the hedge-banks of the country, and its foliage has been so well used in all classes of ornamental work. ”

“ Quite apart from utilitarian considerations, we should be very sorry to lose the Beech, with its towering, massive shaft clad in smooth grey bark, its spreading roots above the soil, and the dense shade of its fine foliage. Fortunately for the lover of natural beauty, it is this luxuriant growth of leaves and the shade it gives that are the redeeming virtues of the Beech [Pg 21] in the eye of the forester. Its drip destroys most of the soil-exhausting weeds, its shade protects the soil from over-evaporation, and the heavy crop of leaves enriches it by their decomposition. ”

“ One of the most pleasing in growth of our forest trees is the Ash, its grey trunk rising to eighty or a hundred feet, and its sweeping branches, the lower ones bending upwards at the tips, clothed with the gracefully curving long pinnate leaves. ”

“ The Long-eared Bat is found chiefly among trees, though it frequently comes into open windows at night when its hunting is over. It flies among the branches of trees and examines the foliage for insects of all kinds. In early spring, when the sallows are in bloom and attracting swarms of insects, the Long-eared Bat is there also: fresh from hibernation and with a keen appetite. He hovers like a hawk over a favourable tree, and swoops down upon his selected prey. ”

“ But in spring, when the fresh green leaves are just showing in spreading tufts, and the reddish-purple female flowers—Tennyson's "rosy plumelets"—hang brightly from the gaunt branches, the Larch wears an entirely different appearance, and in summer the light grace of branches and foliage makes the Larch a beautiful object. That is, one should say, the trees that grow on the very outer edge of the wood, or, better still, one that has been planted as a specimen tree, where it has room to fling out its arms on all sides without touching anything, and can get the abundant light it needs. ”

“ If allowed to grow naturally, without the pollarding which has 140 produced such picturesque monsters as those at Burnham, the Beech-trunk grows clean and straight to a great height, sending off slender, more or less downward-bending, branches with shiny red skins. The twigs bear long, slender, fine-pointed brown buds that are closely mimicked by the snail Clausilia laminata, that loves to haunt the mossy angles between its large spreading roots, and to climb at even up its trunk, which from its smoothness and grey colour is far more suggestive of the gothic column than is the ruddy pine-stem. ”

“ For months they will crawl and hop invisibly among the lush grass and journey through the dense herbage of hedgebottoms and spinneys. Some will come under fences even into our gardens, to help us in an unequal warfare in which the gardener is always defeated by the insect, whether the bigger combatant admits it or not. Their food consists entirely of insects, slugs, and worms. In turn the Frog constitutes the food of many larger animals, including fishes, birds, snakes and weasels. The winter is spent embedded in mud at the pond-bottom, or in damp holes in the earth. ”

“ The Sloe or Blackthorn (Prunus communis) is the rigid many-branched shrub, with stiletto-like tips, that luxuriates on some of our commons and in our hedgerows. The blackish bark that gives its name to the shrub forms a fine foil in March or April for the pure white starry blossoms that brave the cold blasts before the leaf-buds dare unfurl their coverings. ”

“ Often in May and June, as we wander by the riverbank or brookside, we shall happen upon this very coarse but striking plant, though its flowers may not be of the hue depicted here; its colour varies from pale yellow to red and purple. It is one of those plants whose individuality is so strong that, once seen, it will not be forgotten or confused with any other species. It has a branched rootstock, giving off stalked leaves, and an erect angular stem. The stem-leaves are all but stalkless, their bases running down the stem in such a manner as to give it a winged character. ”

“ To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or sea-side stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall. Teach him something of natural history, and you place in his hands a catalogue of those which are worth turning round. Surely our innocent pleasures are not so abundant in this life that we can afford to despise this or any other source of them. ”

“ But in spring the Larch again becomes a thing of beauty, and, as Tennyson sings:—
“Rosy plumelets tuft the Larch,
And rarely sings the mounted thrush;
And underneath the barren bush
Flits by the sea-blue bird of March.”
These “rosy plumelets” are the future cones, and they are very conspicuous on the bare branches. They become ripe by their first Autumn, when they are but little more than an inch in length, rather oval than conical; erect on the branch, and the scales with irregular margins. ”

“ When the tree is isolated sufficiently to come against the sky, you may see one of the prettiest sights in Nature—the pure deep azure of heaven, with the silvery white and fresh green of the birch in opposition. ”

“ The most familiar, the most widely distributed and most numerous of the mammals of our country, the Common or House Mouse, stands in little need of nice description. Although of a timid and retiring nature, it can on occasion exhibit not only bold familiarity, but actual friendliness to mankind to which it has been attached for ages, preferring to live in palace or hovel with human beings to the open-air life of woods and fields. ”

“ One of the prettiest of wayside plants is the golden-starred Agrimony, growing on the waste green flanks of the road and making it beautiful. It is a perennial plant, with a short woody rootstock, and “interruptedly pinnate” leaves, somewhat resembling those of the Silver-weed, the leaflets increasing in size as they near the terminal leaflet. The flowers are borne on that kind of inflorescence called a raceme, in which each flower is attached to the central stem by a stalk of its own. ”

“ The greater the success of the forester, the more profound is the solemn stillness of the forest—and the more monotonous. In place of the natural forest, with its varied and teeming life, we have what Wordsworth called a timber factory. In the natural forest, with its mixture of many kinds of trees, the undergrowth of shrubs, and carpet of grass and weeds, the stronger trees spread out their arms in all directions, and fritter away (as the scientific forester would say) their wood-producing powers in making much firewood and little valuable timber. ”

“ When all the tadpoles have become real little Frogs, with their legs sufficiently firm to enable them to indulge in hopping exercises, they still for a time venture no further than the very shallow water at the extreme edge of the pond, where they can walk partially submerged. Then one day there comes a heavy summer rain storm—a deluge on a small scale. Every little Frog then appears to hear the word "Go!" for with one impulse they all scramble out of the pond into the jungle of wet grass, they know not whither. ”

“ Instead of the moist and shining, bright-coloured coat of the Frog we have a dry, dull, pimply skin so strongly resembling the earth that he is frequently passed by as a lifeless clod. That is one of the Toad's strong points; and he has the patience to squat motionless for hours, tiring out any enemy that looks for movement as proof of life. ”

“ In the early summer it may be the White Vine, or the Virgin’s Bower; in autumn, when the feathery awns are lengthening on its seed-vessels, it may fitly be called the Old Man’s Beard, and when winter has cleared most things away from the hedges, but left these gleaming feathers in abundance, it may give the Traveller Joy to see them as he passes. ”

“ The shell is the ovary that has become woody and hard; the ragged-edged leathery "shuck" is the enlarged bracts that surrounded the minute flower.
The Hazel likes a good soil, and will not really flourish without it, though it will grow almost anywhere, except where the moisture is stagnant. Its wood is said to be best when grown on a chalky subsoil. Of course, as timber, the Hazel does not count, but its tough and pliant rods and staves are valuable for many small uses, such as the making of hoops for casks, walking-sticks, and—divining-rods! The bark is smooth and brown. ”

“ To break the continuity of scent, when he is leaving his form, and again when returning to it, he will suddenly turn at right angles to his former course and make a prodigious leap—fifteen feet or more—to the top of a bank, then take another long bound, perhaps into marshy ground where the scent will not lie, and repairing to the feeding-ground feel safe from being tracked by Fox or Polecat. He always adopts this leaping trick, also the plan of doubling on his track, which has been the admiration and vexation of the hunter from old times. ”

“ Every part of the plant, except the corolla, bristles with short stiff hairs. It has an erect juicy stem, and rough, lance-shaped leaves, the radical ones on long footstalks, those on the stem stalkless and clasping their support. The sepals are five in number, long and narrow, cohering by their bases. The corolla is of the form technically known as rotate, that is, with the petals joined at their lower parts to a short tube, from the top of which five pointed lobes radiate. It is coloured a most brilliant and beautiful blue, such as is rarely seen in flowers. ”

“ Nature mixes her seeds and sows them broadcast over the land she intends to turn into forest, that the more vigorous kinds may act as nurses, sheltering and protecting the less robust. Then comes the struggle for existence, with its final ending in the survival of the fittest. In the mean time the mixed forest has given shelter to an enormous population of smaller fry—plants, mammals, birds, and insects—and has been a delightful recreation ground for man. The timber-producer aims at so controlling the struggle for existence that the survival of the fit is maintained from start to finish. ”

“ It must, however, be admitted that any explanation ought to fit the case of the Hare which often carries its tail with the white underside exposed, but is a solitary animal with no companions to follow it. On the sand dunes the Rabbit's coat renders it invisible through harmony with the sand.
In the ordinary way of life the Rabbit is a silent animal, except that he gives vent to low growls and grunts to express anger or [Pg 117] pleasure; but when terrorised by the imminence of attack by a Stoat the Rabbit finds its voice and gives utterance to a loud scream of agony. ”

“ In July and August the Small-leaved Lime puts forth her yellowy-green blossoms arranged in cymes, the long stalk of which is furnished with a long pale-coloured bract. The flowers consist of five sepals, five petals, a great number of stamens, a five celled globular ovary with simple style and a five-toothed stigma. Only one of the cells matures its two ovules, so that the fruit is two-seeded. The flowers are sweet-scented, and very rich in honey. ”

“ The familiar fruits, too, instead of their usual crimson, are yellow occasionally, as in the Holly. In favourable years these are so plentiful that they quite kill the effect of the dark-green leaves, and when such a tree is seen in the October sunshine, it appears to be glowing with fire to its centre. Beneath the ripe mealy flesh there is a hard bony core, in whose cells the seeds are protected from digestion when the fruit has been swallowed by a bird. ”