Glebe

“ And he cleared the wood round about, leaving only tree stumps and bushes; and close by in a ravine, between high fir-trees, ran a river, always full to the brim even in midsummer, owing to the melting snows, and of greenish waters, cold and rapid exceedingly; and around, up hill and down dale, stretched the wood of firs, larches, pines, and other noble and useful trees, emitting a very pleasant and virtuous fragrance. The man thought to enjoy his house, and came with his family, and servants, and horses, and mules, and oxen, which he had employed to carry down the timber and charcoal. ”

“ Crows perch upon the backs of sheep, The wheat goes yellow: women reap, Autumn winds ruffle brook and pond, Flutter the hedge and fly beyond. So the first things of nature run, And stand not still for any one, Contemptuous of the distant cry Wherewith you harrow earth and sky. ”

“ Vast waves of undulating meadow and farm land appear with fields of gleaming grain and clamps of elm, oak and maple to break its smoothly flowing billows. Farther away rise higher treeless ridges or wooded slopes, but all alike are smoothly flowing. ”

“ The trees were just as nature made them, and so was the grass, which in places was lying long, dry and withered under the sun, weeds creeping up in damp places, and the gravel of the pathway scattered upon the verges. ”

“ Leaving the road behind, therefore, and heading still eastward, you cross a ridge where the hardwoods stand, as their ancestors stood, untouched by the tools of men. Immense trunks of beech or sugar-maple or yellow birch tower upward wide apart, the moss of centuries upon them; far overhead is a delicate tracery of leaves, a dance of light against the blue, and over all is the blessed silence. ”

“ Nestled among the woods, clothing its hollows on almost every side, rises a low hill, with a species of table land on the top, scattered over with large thorns and scraggy oaks that cast their shadows over the pale buff bents of the short soft grass of the gravelly soil. ”

“ When the spring floods have passed and the warm rains follow through lengthening days of sun, grass and flowers arise with magic swiftness from a wonderfully fertile soil. Trees bud and leaf; berries form hard on the blossoming. ”

“ Down rushed the steep slopes to the plain, clad in the decaying leaf and mast of former years, and at the edges of these precipitous glades, or scattered at long intervals across them, great single trees emerged, the types and masters of the forest, their trunks, incomparably tall, and all their noble limbs, now thinly veiled by a departing leafage, drawn sharp, in black and silver, on the pale background of the chalk plain. ”

“ Hid as yet within the sheath are those sturdy heads of cocks-foot grass which, later in the summer, will bring into the silence of the hills gangs of grass-seeders, broad-hatted, bent of back, sickle in hand—owing to the slope and surface, machinery is worthless here—to gather in its harvest. ”

“ If, at times, I dream behind all this a grove, with now and then one of its broad, steepling or columnar trees pushed forward upon the lawn, it is only there that I see anything so stalwart as a pine or so rigid as a spruce. ”

“ Imagine a vast and gently-swelling pasture of the brightest green grass, stretching away from you on every side, behind, toward these hills I have described, in all other directions, to a belt of tall trees, all growing up with noble proportions, from the generous soil. ”

“ Immediately around us flowers, ferns, and shrubs adorn every bit of silvery gray rock, whilst wherever space admits we see noble trees, pines, oaks, beeches, some of marvellous growth, yet perched on heights so remote and lofty as to appear mere tufts of grass. ”

“ The ground looms a little ahead. And as it rises, the dead grass ceases underneath my feet. My feet tread sterile clay: they strike on it hard as if the clay were frozen, and yet the air of the field is wet and sultry.... My feet stop.
I am at the top of the little loom of the ground. ”

“ In the crevices of the rocks where a scanty soil has accumulated, is here and there planted a hardy evergreen, whose short and gnarled trunk, recurved and inflexible branches, proclaim the storms it has withstood, and the centuries during which it has vegetated. ”

“ Entering among the thickets, I find the soil strewn with old leaves of preceding seasons, through which may be seen a black or dark mould; the roots of trees stretch frequently across the path; often a moss-grown brown log lies athwart, and when you set your foot down, it sinks into the decaying substance,—into the heart of oak or pine. ”

“ Some, falling on meadows and bogs, creep silently out of sight to the grass roots, hiding softly as in a nest, slipping, oozing hither, thither, seeking and finding their appointed work. Some, descending through the spires of the woods, sift spray through the shining needles, whispering peace and good cheer to each one of them. ”

“ A dull grey expanse of leaden cloud shut out the blue heaven, a hard black frost pinched up the ground, the blades of grass stood stiff and rugged on the frozen soil, and vague grey mists lay in all the hollows of the ground. ”

“ Unto a farmstead’s windowed rose,
And roof of moss and shingle.
Then darkly, darkly through the brush,
And dimly round the boulder,
Where cane and water-weeds grow lush,
Its current clear flows colder. ”

“ It is this trim and certain growth that sets out the fir from all the mountain trees, and gives to the young saplings a secret look as they stand straight and stiffly among the wild brambles on the hill. ”

“ But the grass is still green, and the trees thick with foliage, the fields neatly ploughed and tilled and cultivated, with here and there a staring notice planted on the edge of a field, where the long, straight drills are sprinkled with budding green—'Crops sown. ”

“ Once the perfection of blooming richness and taste,—the beds without a weed, the gravel trimly raked and shining, bright channels of limpid water running amid the flowers, and beautiful birds of gay plumage caged beneath the shady shrubs,—now all was overrun with rank grass and tall weeds ”

“ The thin soil of a rocky hill, when deprived of its shelter of branches, will be burned by the summer sun out of all power to help the germination of any worthy seed, or to nurture so noble a plant as a tree through the tender days of its infancy. ”

“ The land covered with beautiful grass, with sheep lying about upon it, as fat as hogs stretched out sleeping in a stye. Everything grows well here: earth without a stone so big as a pin's head; grass as thick as it can grow on the ground. ”

“ The ploughboys know it, and the wayside children, the mower and those who linger in fields, but few else. Brightly blue and surrounded by greenest grass, imbedded in and all the more blue for the shadow of the grass, these growing butterflies' wings draw to themselves the sun. ”

“ In the valleys, and on the southern slopes, no sooner has the returning heat of summer melted the snow, than a beautiful carpeting of verdure, diversified by flowers of various tints, spreads over the soil, displaying an astonishing rapidity of development, while the rocks in many places appear covered with cryptogamic plants. ”

“ Often he flits down from his pine-needles into the coarse, tufty grass just bounding the plantation, bustles and fairy-fusses there for a little, then is up again amongst his needles, pecking the frost from them. ”

“ When we speak of grass we generally mean [Pg 29] one thing, the small slim green herb which carpets the familiar earth. But there are many grasses, from the smooth close-set herb of our lawns or the sheep-nibbled downy greenness of mountain-pastures, to the forest-like groves which sway in the torrid winds of the south. Of these alone much might be written. I prefer, however, that name I have placed at the head of this article—taken, if I remember rightly, from a poem by the Gaelic mountain-poet, Duncan Ban Macintyre—and used in the sense of the original. ”

“ The woods, as well as the single timber trees that occasionally start up with such fine effect from out of the hedge-rows, or in the midst of meadows and corn-fields, we shall now find sprinkled with what at first looks like gleams of scattered sunshine lying among the leaves, but what, on examination, we shall find to be the new foliage that has been put forth since midsummer, and which yet retains all the brilliant green of the spring. ”

“ In the meadows and along the fringes of the woods the white rime lay thick and powdery on grass and dead leaves; every foot that touched it left a black mark, as if seared with a hot iron, when the sun came up and shone upon it. ”

“ At certain portions of the slope the firs begin again and go on up the hill with the birches, slender and beautiful, aspiring and inspiring, and even along among the bleak rocks they creep, soft green mats of spreading limbs, flecked here and there with the yellow of creeping birches and the maroon of low blueberries, all this patterned among the exquisite lichen-grays of the rocks. ”

“ Nature loves such woods, and places her own seal upon them. Here she shows me what can be done with ferns and mosses and lichens. The soil is marrowy and full of innumerable forests. Standing in these fragrant aisles, I feel the strength of the vegetable kingdom and am awed by the deep and inscrutable processes of life going on so silently about me. ”

“ The shrub, with its hardy roots interlaced through the soil, and binding the very stones, grows rich in its bright greenery. Eventually the tree springs from the soil, and where once the tempest beat on the bare cold rock, is now the lordly and branching monarch of the forest, with its thousand leaves, affording shelter from the storm for bird and beast. ”

“ The beeches and oaks become fewer as the ground rises, there are wide spaces of bracken and little woods or copses, every one of which is called a 'shaw.' Then come the firs, whose crowded spires, each touching each, succeed for miles, and cover the hill-side with a solid mass of green. They seem so close together, so thickened and matted, impenetrable to footsteps, like a mound of earth rather than woods, a solid block of wood ”

“ There is very little vegetation, only a few streaks and bunches of grass that grow along the cracks in the rocky surface, or in wind-carried soil that has been caught in crevices. It is one of the wildest places you can imagine, and as we go upward it becomes more so. ”

“ Every river-bed was full of mighty reeds, whose stems clattered together when the wind blew like swords on shields, and every now and then a bit of forest was woven together with the ropey stems of giant creepers till no man or beast could have passed save for the paths which constant use had kept open through the mazes. ”

“ Young groves of spruce and pine are bowed down as by a gentle hand and put to rest, not again to see the light or move leaf or limb until the grand awakening of the springtime, while the larger animals and most of the birds seek food and shelter in the foothills on the borders of the valleys and plains. ”

“ Their bare arms and legs are knotted and misshapen from the severe toil of the fields; their twisted bodies have taken on the hue of the earth—working in the soil from the dawn of day, they seem to have something in common with the trees and the roots. ”

“ Above this level, where the virgin soil has not been yet reclaimed, or where the winds of winter bring down freezing currents from the mountains through a gap or gully of the lower hills, a tangled growth of heaths and arbutus, and pines, and rosemarys, and myrtles, continue the vegetation, till it finally ends in bare grey rocks and peaks some thousand feet in height. ”

“ Surely if the grass could reason, it would prefer, while fresh and beautiful, to be cropped by the lamb and converted into his substance, than, by staying a little longer, to disfigure the fields with its faded foliage. ”

“ Stumps of dwarf trees replace the straight saplings to be seen lower down; and hardly are we on the crest of one snow-capped hill than another, hidden under the same smooth sheet of everlasting lime-white, mocks us. ”

“ A wood is trying to grow up on the grassland. If left alone, an oak or beech forest would, after many years, spread over all our grass pastures and hay-fields. These tall herbs are the pioneers, and the briers and brambles are its advanced guard. ”

“ After crossing two or three such fields you come upon an unreclaimed patch, or belt, where grey-lichened rocks are mixed with masses of old furze bushes, and heath and tussocks of pale brome-grass. A lonely, silent, peaceful place, where, albeit a habitation of man for untold centuries, it is wild Nature still. ”

“ When approached it becomes silent, and dropping to the ground conceals itself in the grass. Under a cardoon-bush or tussock of grass it scoops out a slight hollow in the ground, and builds over this a dome of fine dry grass, leaving a small aperture arched like the door of a baker’s oven. ”

“ The grass that overspread the ground, the branches and foliage of the trees, all shone with that reddish and moveable light which varies in its intensity at the will of the animal by which it is produced. ”

“ We wind among the gravel paths that intersect the lawn, delight our eyes with the groups of shrubbery, still very young, that are so tastefully scattered here and there, and with the gay beds of carefully tended flowers. ”

“ The road leading out of the wood opens upon a barren plain, covered with hillocks composed of a fine loose sand, which, constantly drifting from place to place, presents the growth of a single blade of vegetation. ”

“ Looking down when I walked in the fields the young spring grass could be seen thrusting up its blades among the old and dead, but at a distance of a few yards these delicate living green threads were invisible. ”