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THE CALL OF THE
WILDFLOWER
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[Illustration: _G. P. Abraham & Sons._] [_Photo. Keswick_
THE HAUNT OF THE SPIDERWORT
The Devil's Kitchen, Carnarvonshire]
THE CALL OF THE
WILDFLOWER
BY
HENRY S. SALT
[Illustration]
LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD
RUSKIN HOUSE, 40 MUSEUM STREET, W.C.
_First published in 1922_
(_All rights reserved_)
TO
MY FRIENDS
W. J. JUPP and E. BERTRAM LLOYD
NOTE
I am indebted to the courtesy of the editors of the _Daily News_, _Pall
Mall Gazette_, _Liverpool Daily Post_, and _Sussex Daily News_, for
permission to reprint in this book the substance of articles that first
appeared in their columns.
My obligation to Jack London, in regard to the choice of a title, will
be apparent.
CONTENTS
PAGE
I. THE CALL OF THE WILDFLOWER 9
II. ON SUSSEX SHINGLES 21
III. BY DITCH AND DIKE 29
IV. LIKENESSES THAT BAFFLE 37
V. BOTANESQUE 43
VI. THE OPEN DOWNLAND 50
VII. PRISONERS OF THE PARTERRE 58
VIII. PICKING AND STEALING 63
IX. ROUND A SURREY CHALK-PIT 68
X. A SANDY COMMON 77
XI. QUAINTNESS IN FLOWERS 85
XII. HERTFORDSHIRE CORNFIELDS 90
XIII. THE SOWER OF TARES 97
XIV. DALES OF DERBYSHIRE 103
XV. NO THOROUGHFARE! 113
XVI. LIMESTONE COASTS AND CLIFFS 121
XVII. ON PILGRIMAGE TO INGLEBOROUGH 128
XVIII. A BOTANOPHILIST'S JOURNAL 133
XIX. FELONS AND OUTLAWS 139
XX. SOME MARSH-DWELLERS 144
XXI. A NORTHERN MOOR 151
XXII. APRIL IN SNOWDONIA 158
XXIII. FLOWER-GAZING _IN EXCELSIS_ 164
XXIV. COVES OF HELVELLYN 171
XXV. GREAT DAYS 178
XXVI. THE LAST ROSE 185
INDEX 191
The Call of the Wildflower
I
THE CALL OF THE WILDFLOWER
_Tantus amor florum._
VIRGIL.
THE "call of the wild," where the love of flowers is concerned, has an
attraction which is not the less powerful because it is difficult to
explain. The charm of the garden may be strong, but it is not so strong
as that which draws us to seek for wildflowers in their native haunts,
whether of shore or water-meadow, field or wood, moorland or mountain. A
garden is but a "zoo" (with the cruelty omitted); and just as the true
natural history is that which sends us to study animals in the wilds,
not to coop them in cages, so the true botany must bring man to the
flower, not the flower to man.
That the lovers of wildflowers--those, at least, who can give active
expression to their love--are not a numerous folk, is perhaps not
surprising; for even a moderate knowledge of the subject demands such
favourable conditions as free access to nature, with opportunities for
observation beyond what most persons command; but what they lack in
numbers they make up in zeal, and to none is the approach of spring more
welcome than to those who are then on the watch for the reappearance of
floral friends.
For it is as friends, not garden captives or herbarium specimens, that
the flower-lover desires to be acquainted with flowers. It is not their
uses that attract him; _that_ is the business of the herbalist. Nor is
it their structure and analysis; the botanist will see to that. What he
craves is a knowledge of the loveliness, the actual life and character
of plants in their relation to man--what may be called the spiritual
aspect of flowers--and this is seen and felt much more closely when they
are sought in their free wild state than when they are cultivated on
rockery or in parterre.
The reality of this love of wildflowers is evident, but its cause and
meaning are less easy to discern. Is it only part of a modern "return to
nature," or a sign of some latent sympathy between plant and man? We do
not know; but we know that our interest in flowers is no longer
utilitarian, as in the herbalism of a bygone time, or decorative and
aesthetic, as in the immemorial use of the garland on festive occasions,
and in the association of the wine-cup with the rose. The "great
affection" that Chaucer felt for the daisy marked a new era; and later
poets have carried the sentiment still further, till it reached a climax
in the faith that Wordsworth avowed:
One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can.
Here is a new herbalism--of the heart. We smile nowadays at the
credulity of the old physicians, who rated so highly the virtues of
certain plants as to assert, for example, that comfrey--the "great
consound," as they called it--had actual power to unite and solidify a
broken bone. But how if there be flowers that can in very truth make
whole a broken spirit? Even in the Middle Ages it was recognized that
mental benefit was to be gained from this source, as when betony was
extolled for its value in driving away despair, and when _fuga daemonum_
was the name given to St. John's-wort, that golden-petaled amulet which,
when hung over a doorway, could put all evil spirits to flight. That,
like many another flower, it can put "the blues" to flight, is a fact
which no modern flower-lover will doubt.
But what may be called the anthropocentric view of wildflowers is now
happily becoming obsolete. "Their beauty was given them for our
delight," wrote Anne Pratt in one of the pleasantest of her books:[1]
"God sent them to teach us lessons of Himself." It would somewhat spoil
our joy in the beauty of wildflowers if we thought they had been "sent,"
like potted plants from a nursery, for any purpose whatsoever; for it is
their very naturalness, their independence of man, that charms us, and
our regard for them is less the prosaic satisfaction of an owner in his
property, than the love of a friend, or even the worship of a devotee:
The devotion to something afar
From the sphere of our sorrow.
[Footnote 1: _Haunts of the Wild Flowers._]
This, I think, is the true gospel of the love of flowers, though as yet
it has found but little expression in the literature of the subject.
"Flowers as flowers," was Thoreau's demand, when he lamented in his
journal that there was no book which treated of them in that light, no
real "biography" of plants. The same want is felt by the English reader
to-day: there is no writer who has done for the wildflower what Mr. W.
H. Hudson has done for the bird.[2]
[Footnote 2: Unless it be Canon John Vaughan, in those two delightful
books of his, _The Wild-Flowers of Selborne_ and _The Music of
Wild-Flowers_.]
Indeed, the books mostly fail, not only to portray the life of the
plant, but even to give an intelligible account of its habitat and
appearance; for very few writers, however sound their technical
knowledge, possess the gift of lucid description--a gift which depends,
in its turn, upon that sympathy with other minds which enables an author
to see precisely what instruction is needed. Thus it often happens
that, unless personal help is available, it is a matter of great
difficulty for a beginner to learn the haunts of flowers, or to
distinguish them when found; for when he refers to the books he finds
much talk about inessential things, and little that goes directly to the
point.
One might have thought that a new and strange flower would attract the
eye more readily than a known one, but it is not so; the old is detected
much more easily than the new. "Out of sight, out of mind," says the
proverb; and conversely that which is not yet in mind will long tarry
out of sight. But when once a new flower, even a rare one, has been
discovered, it is curious how often it will soon be noticed afresh in
another place: this, I think, must be the experience of all who have
made systematic search for flowers, and it explains why the novice will
frequently see but little where the expert will see much.
Not until the various initial obstacles have been overcome can one
appreciate the true "call of the wild," the full pleasures of the chase.
When we have learnt not only what plants are to be looked for, but those
two essential conditions, the _when_ and the _where_; the rule of season
and of soil; the flowers that bloom in spring, in summer, or in autumn;
the flowers that grow by shore, meadow, bog, river, or mountain; on
chalk, limestone, sand, or clay--then the quest becomes more effective,
and each successive season will add materially to our widening circle
of acquaintance.
Then, too, we may begin to discard that rather vapid class of
literature, the popular flower-book, which too often deals sentimentally
in vague descriptions of plants, diversified with bad illustrations, and
with edifying remarks about the goodness of the Creator, and may find a
new and more rational interest in the published _Floras_ of such
counties or districts as have yet received that distinction. For dry
though it is in form, a _Flora_, with its classified list of plants, and
its notes collected from many sources, past and present, as to their
"stations" in the county, becomes an almost romantic book of adventure,
when the student can supply the details from his own knowledge, and so
read with illumination "between the lines." Here, let us suppose it to
be said, is a locality where grows some rare and beautiful flower, one
of the prizes of the chase. What hopes and aspirations such an assurance
may arouse! What encouragement to future enterprise! What regrets, it
may be, for some almost forgotten omission in the past, which left that
very neighbourhood unsearched! It is possible that a cold,
matter-of-fact entry in a local _Flora_ will thus throw a sudden light
on some bygone expedition, and show us that if we had but taken a
slightly different direction in our walk--but it is vain to lament what
is irreparable!
Of such musings upon the might-have-been I can myself speak with
feeling, for I was not so fortunate in my youth as to be initiated into
the knowledge of flowers: it was not till much later in life, as I
wandered among the Welsh and English mountains, that the scales fell
from my eyes, and looking on the beauty of the saxifrages I realized
what glories I had missed. Thus I was compelled to put myself to school,
so to speak, and to make a study of wildflowers with the aid of such
books as were available, a process which, like a botanical Jude the
Obscure, I found by no means easy. The self-educated man, we know, is
apt to be perverse and opinionated; so I trust my readers will make due
allowance if they notice such faults in this book. I can truly plead, as
the illiterate do, that "I'm no scholar, more's the pity." But it was my
friends and acquaintances--those, at least, who had some botanical
knowledge--who were the chief sufferers during this period of inquiry;
and, looking back, I often marvel at the patience with which they
endured the problems with which I confronted them. I remember waylaying
my friend, W. J. Jupp, a very faithful flower-lover, with some mutilated
and unrecognizable labiate plant which I thought might be calamint, and
how tactfully he suggested that my conjecture was "near enough." On
another occasion it was Edward Carpenter, the Sage of Millthorpe, or
Wild Sage, as some botanical friend once irreverently described him,
who volunteered to assist me, by means of a scientific book which shows,
by an unerring process, how to eliminate the wrong flowers, until at the
end you are left with the right one duly named. All through the list we
went; but there must have been a slip somewhere; for in the conclusion
one thing alone was clear--that whatever my plant might be, it was not
that which the scientific book indicated. Of all my friends and helpers,
Bertram Lloyd, whose acquaintance with wildflowers is unusually large,
and to whom, in all that pertains to natural history, I am as the "gray
barbarian" (_vide_ Tennyson) to "the Christian child," was the most
constant and long-suffering: he solved many of my enigmas, and
introduced me to some of his choicest flower-haunts among the Chiltern
Hills. In the course of my researches I was sometimes referred for
guidance to persons who were known in their respective home-circles as
"the botanists of the family," a title which I found was not quite
equivalent to that of "the complete botanist." There was one "botanist
of the family" who was visibly embarrassed when I asked her the name of
a plant that is common on the chalk hills, but is so carelessly
described in the books as to be easily confused with other kindred
species. She gazed at it long, with a troubled eye, and then, as if
feeling that her domestic reputation must at all hazards be upheld,
replied firmly: "Hemp-nettle." Hemp-nettle it was not; it was wild
basil; but years after, when I began to have similar questions put to
myself, I realized how disconcerting it is to be thus suddenly
interrogated. It made me understand why Cabinet Ministers so frequently
insist that they must have "notice of that Question." With one complete
botanist, however, I was privileged to become acquainted, Mr. C. E.
Salmon, whose special diocese, so to speak, is the county of Surrey, but
whose intimate knowledge of wildflowers extends to many counties and
coasts. Not a few favours did I receive from him, in certifying for me
some of the more puzzling plants; and very good-naturedly he bore the
disappointment when, on his asking me to send him, for his _Flora of
Surrey_, a list of the rarer flowers in the neighbourhood where I was
living, I included among them the small bur-parsley (_caucalis
daucoides_), a vanished native, a prodigal son of the county, whose
return would have been a matter for gladness. But alas, my plant was not
a _caucalis_ at all, but a _torilis_, a squat weed of the cornfields,
which by its superficial resemblance to its rare cousin had grossly
imposed upon my ignorance. It is when he has acquired some familiarity
with the ordinary British plants that a flower-lover, thus educated late
in life, finds his thoughts turning to the vanished opportunities of the
past. I used to speculate regretfully on what I had missed in my early
wanderings in wild places; as in the Isle of Skye, where I picked up the
eagle's feather, but overlooked the mountain flower; or on Ben Lawers,
a summit rich in rare Alpines to which I then was stone-blind; or in a
score of other localities which I can scarcely hope to revisit. But
time, which heals all things, brought me a sort of compensation for
these delinquencies; for with a fuller knowledge of plants I could to
some extent reconstruct in imagination the sights that were formerly
unseen, and with the eye of faith admire the Alpine forget-me-not on the
ridges of Ben Lawers, or the yellow butterwort in the marshes of Skye.
Nor was it always in imagination only; for sometimes a friend would send
me a rare flower from some distant spot; and then there was pleasure
indeed in the opening of the parcel and in anticipating what it might
contain--the pasque-flower perhaps, or the wild tulip, or the Adonis, or
the golden samphire, or some other of the many local treasures that make
glad the flower-lover's heart. The exhibitions of wildflowers that are
now held in the public libraries of not a few towns are extremely
useful, and often awake a love of nature in minds where it has hitherto
been but dormant. A queer remark was once made to me by a visitor at the
Brighton show. "This is a good institution," he said. "It saves you from
tramping for the flowers yourself." I had not regarded the exhibition in
that light; on the contrary, it stimulates many persons to a pursuit
which is likely to fascinate them more and more.
For no tramps can be pleasanter than those in quest of wildflowers;
especially if one has a fellow-enthusiast for companion: failing that,
it is wiser to go alone; for when a flower-lover tramps with someone who
has no interest in the pursuit, the result is likely to be
discomfiting--he must either forgo his own haltings and deviations, with
the probability that he will miss something valuable, or he must feel
that he is delaying his friend. In a company, I always pray that their
number may be uneven, and that it may not be necessary to march stolidly
in pairs, where "one to one is cursedly confined," as Dryden said of
matrimony; or worst of all, where one's yoke-fellow may insist, as
sometimes happens, on walking "in step," and be forever shuffling his
feet as if obeying the commands of some invisible drill-sergeant. It is
not with the feet that we should seek harmony, but with the heart. My
intention in this book is to speak of the more noteworthy flowers of a
few distinctive localities that are known to me, starting from the coast
of Sussex, and ascending to the high mountains of Wales and the
north-west: I propose also to intersperse the descriptive chapters, here
and there with discussions of such special topics as may incidentally
arise. And here, at the outset, I was tempted to say a few words about
my own favourite flowers--not such universally admired beauties as the
primrose, violet, daffodil, hyacinth, forget-me-not, and the others,
whose names will readily suggest themselves; for, lovely as they are,
it would be superfluous to add to their praises; but rather of some less
famous plants, the saints and anchorites of the floral world, the
flower-lover's flowers--not the popular, but the best-beloved. On second
thoughts, however, I will leave these choicest ones, with a single
exception, to be mentioned in their due place and surroundings, and will
here name but one of them, a flower which is among the first, not only
in the order of merit, but in the order of the seasons.
The greater stitchwort, as writers tell us, is one of "the most
ornamental of our early flowers"; but surely it is something more than
that. The radiance of those white stars that stud the hedge-banks and
road-sides in April and May, is dearer to some of us than many of the
more favoured blossoms that poets have sung of. The dull English name
quite fails to do justice to the almost ethereal lustre of the flower:
the Latin _stellaria_ is truer and more expressive. The reappearance of
the stitchwort, like that of the orange-tip butterfly, is one of the
keenest joys of spring; and one of our keenest regrets in spring is that
the stitchwort's flowering-season is so short.
II
ON SUSSEX SHINGLES
Salt and splendid from the circling brine.
SWINBURNE.
WHERE should a flower-lover begin his story if not from the sea shore?
Earth has been poetically described as "daughter of ocean"; and the
proximity of the sea has a most genial and stimulating effect upon its
grandchildren the flowers, not those only that are peculiar to the
beach, but also the inland kinds. There is no "dead sea" lack of
vegetation on our coasts, but a marked increase both in the luxuriance
of plants and in their beauty.
Sussex is rich in "shingles"--flat expanses of loose pebbles formerly
thrown up by the waves, and now lying well above high-water mark, or
even stretching landward for some distance. One might have expected
these stony tracts to be barren in the extreme; in fact they are the
nursery-ground of a number of interesting flowers, including some very
rare ones; and in certain places, where the stones are intersected by
banks of turf, the eye is surprised by a veritable garden in the
wilderness. Let us imagine ourselves on one of these shingle-beds in the
early summer, when the show of flowers is at its brightest: and first at
Shoreham--"Shoreham, crowned with the grace of years," as Swinburne
described it.
Alas! the Shoreham beach, which until less than twenty years ago was in
a natural state, has been so overbuilt with ship-works and bungalows
that it has become little else than a suburb of Brighton; yet even now
the remaining strip of shingle, stretching for half a mile between sea
and harbour, is the home of some delightful plants. In the more favoured
spots the gay mantle thrown over the stony strand is visible at the
first glance in a wonderful blending of colours--the gold of horned
poppy, stonecrop, melilot, and kidney vetch; the white of sea-campion;
the delicate pink of thrift; and the fiery reds and blues of the
gorgeous viper's bugloss--and when a nearer scrutiny is made, a number
of minute plants will be found growing in close company along the grassy
ridges. The most attractive of these are the graceful little spring
vetch (_vicia lathyroides_), the rue-leaved saxifrage, and that tiny
turquoise gem which is apt to escape notice, the dwarf forget-me-not--a
trio of the daintiest blossoms, red, white, and blue, that eyes could
desire to behold.
Shoreham has long been famous for its clovers; and some are still in
great force there, especially the rigid trefoil (_trifolium scabrum_),
and its congener, _trifolium striatum_, with which it is often confused,
while the better-known hare's-foot also covers a good deal of the
ground. But there is a sad tale to tell of the plant which once the
chief pride of these shingles, the starry-headed trefoil, a very lovely
pink flower fringed with silky hairs, which, though not a native, has
been naturalized near the bank of the harbour since 1804, but now, owing
to the enclosures made for ship-building works, has been all but
exterminated. "This," wrote the author of the _Flora of Sussex_ (1907)
"is one of the most beautiful of our wildflowers, and is found in
Britain at Shoreham only. Fortunately it is very difficult to extirpate
any of the _leguminosae_, and it may therefore be hoped that it may long
continue to adorn the beach at Shoreham." The hope seems likely to be
frustrated. Among the rubble of concrete slabs, and piles of timber,
only three or four tufts of the trefoil were surviving last year, with
every likelihood of these also disappearing as the place is further
"developed." The second of the Shoreham rarities, the pale yellow vetch
(_vicia lutea_) has fared better, owing to its wider range, and is still
scattered freely over the yet unenclosed shingles. It is a charming
flower; but its doom in Sussex seems to be inevitable, for the
bungalows, with their back-yards, tennis-courts, "tradesmen's
entrances," and other amenities of villadom, will doubtless continue to
encroach upon what was once a wild and unsullied tract.
Still sadder is the fate of the devastated coast on the Brighton side of
the harbour-mouth, where the low cliffs that overlook the lagoon from
Southwick to Fisher's-gate have long been known to botanists as worthy
of some attention. Here, on the grassy escarpment, the rare Bithynian
vetch used once to grow, as we learn from Mrs. Merrifield's interesting
_Sketch of the Natural History of Brighton_ (1860); and here we may
still find such plants as the sea-radish, a large coarse crucifer with
yellow flowers and queer knotted seed-pods; the blue clary, or
wild-sage, running riot in great profusion; the fragrant soft-leaved
fennel; the strange star-thistle (_calcitrapa_), so-called from its
fancied resemblance to an ancient and diabolical military instrument,
the caltrop, an iron ball armed with sharp points, which was thrown on
the ground to maim the horses in a cavalry charge; the pale-flowered
narrow-leaved flax; and lastly, that rather uncanny shrub of the
poisonous nightshade order, with small purple flowers and scarlet
berries, which is called the "tea-tree," though the tea which its leaves
might furnish would hardly make a palatable brew.
Below these cliffs, on an embankment that divides the waters of the
lagoon from the seashore, there still flourishes in plenty the fleshy
leaved samphire, once sought after for a pickle, and ever famous through
the reference in _King Lear_ to "one who gathers samphire, dreadful
trade." In this locality there is no dreadful trade, except that of
reducing a once pleasant shore to an unsightly slag-heap.
Let me now turn from this melancholy spectacle to those Sussex shingles
on which the Admiralty and the contractor have not as yet laid a heavy
and ruinous hand. On some of the more spacious of these pebbly beaches,
as on that which lies between Eastbourne and Pevensey, the traveller may
still experience the feeling expressed by Shelley:
I love all waste
And solitary places, where we taste
The pleasure of believing what we see
Is boundless, as we wish our souls to be.
From Langney Point one looks north-east along a desolate shore, beyond
which the ruins of Pevensey Castle are seen in the distance, and the
width of the shingly belt between the sea and the high-road is at this
point scarcely less than a mile. A scene that is bleak and barren enough
in its general aspect; but a search soon reveals the presence of floral
treasures, the first of which is a rather rare member of the Pink
family, the soapwort, which I had long sought in vain until I met with
it growing in abundance close to the outskirts of Eastbourne, where it
roots so luxuriantly in the loose shingles as to make one wonder why it
is so fastidious elsewhere. Among other noticeable inhabitants of these
flats, or of the shallow marshy depressions which they enclose, are
hairy crowfoot, catmint, white melilot, stinking groundsel,
strawberry-headed trefoil, and candytuft--the last-named a rather
unexpected flower in such a place.
Still nearer to the sea, not many yards removed from the spray of the
waves at their highest, the wild seakale is plentiful; a stout glabrous
cabbage, with thick curly leaves and white cruciferous blossoms, it
rises straight out of the bare stones, and thrives exceedingly when the
folk who stroll along the shore can so far restrain their destructive
tendencies as not to hack and mangle it. In its company, perhaps, or in
similar situations, will be seen its first-cousin, the sea-rocket, a
quaint and pleasant crucifer with zigzag stems, fleshy leaves, and pale
lilac petals. The sea-pea, formerly native near Pevensey, is now hardly
to be hoped for.
One of the most naturally attractive spots on the Sussex coast is
Cuckmere Haven, near Seaford, a gap in the chalk cliffs, about half a
mile in width, through which the river Cuckmere finds a dubious exit to
the sea. Were it not for the abomination of the rifle-butts, which
sometimes close the shore to the public, no more delectable nook could
be desired; and to the flower-lover the little shelf of shingle which
forms the beach is full of charm. Here, growing along the grassy margin
of brackish pools, and itself so like a flowering grass that a sharp eye
is needed to detect it, one may find that singular umbelliferous
plant--not at all resembling the other members of its tribe--the slender
hare's-ear (_bupleurum tenuissimum_), thin, wiry, dark-green, with
narrow lance-like leaves and minute yellow umbels. Near by, the small
sea-heath, one of the prettiest of maritime flowers, makes a dense
carpet; on the corner of the adjacent cliff the lesser and rarer
sea-lavender (_statice binervosa_) is plentiful, and in the late summer
blooms at a considerable height on the narrow ledges.
Pagham "Harbour," a wild estuary of some extent, between Selsey and
Bognor, is another locality that has earned a reputation for its
flowers, the most remarkable of which is the very local proliferous
pink, which has long been known as abundant on that portion of the
coast, though elsewhere very infrequent. A pleasant walk of about three
miles leads from Bognor to Pagham, along a sandy shore fringed with very
luxuriant tamarisk-bushes; and when one reaches the stony reef where
further progress is barred by the waters or sand-shoals of the
"Harbour," the little pink, which bears a superficial resemblance to
thrift, will be seen springing up freely among the pebbles. We are told
that only one of its blossoms opens at a time; but this is the sort of
statement, often copied from book to book, which is not verified by
experience, or to which at least many exceptions must be admitted. What
is certain is that the proliferous pink has a considerable share of the
distinctive grace of its family, and that the occasion of first
encountering it will live in the flower-lover's memory.
I have named but a few--those personally known to me--of the rarer or
more characteristic shingle-flowers; and in so wide a field there is
always the chance of new discoveries: hence the unfailing interest, to
the botanist, of places which, apart from their flora, are likely to be
shunned as wearisome. The shore itself is seldom without visitors; but
the shingles that stretch back from the shore rarely attract the
footsteps even of the hardiest walkers. It is only when there has been a
murder in one of those solitary spots--or at least something that the
newspapers can describe as "dramatic" or "sensational"--that the
holiday-folk in the neighbouring towns forsake for a day or two the
pleasures of pier or parade, and sally forth over the stony wildernesses
in a search for "clues"; as when the "Crumbles," near Eastbourne, was
the scene, two years ago, of a murder, and at a later date of a ghost.
To discover the foot of some partially buried victim protruding from the
pebbles--_that_ is deemed a sufficient object for a pilgrimage. The gold
of the sea-poppy and the pink of the thrift are trifles that are passed
unseen.
III
BY DITCH AND DIKE
On either side
Is level fen, a prospect wild and wide.
CRABBE.
"LEVELS," or "brooks," is the name commonly given in Sussex to a number
of grassy tracts, often of wide extent, which, though still in a state
of semi-wildness, have been so far reclaimed from primitive fens as to
afford a rough pasturage for horses and herds of cattle, the ground
being drained and intersected by dikes and sluggish streams. In these
spacious and unfrequented flats wildfowl of various kinds are often to
be seen; herons stand motionless by the pools, or flap slowly away if
disturbed in their meditation; pewits wheel and cry overhead; and the
redshank, most clamorous of birds during the nesting-season, makes such
a din as almost to distract the attention of the intruding botanist. For
it is the botanist who is specially drawn to these wild water-ways,
where hours may be profitably spent in strolling beside the brooks, with
the certainty of seeing many interesting plants and the chance of
finding some unfamiliar ones; nor is there anything to mar his
enjoyment, except the possible meeting with a bull on a wide arena from
which there is no ready exit, save by jumping a muddy ditch or by
crossing one of the narrow and precarious planks which do duty as
footbridges.
These "levels," though often bordering on a tidal river, are not
themselves salt marshes, nor is their flora a maritime one; in that
respect they differ from the East-coast fens described by Crabbe in one
of his _Tales_, "The Lover's Journey"; a passage which has been praised
as one of the best pictures ever given of dike-land scenery. There are
lines in it which might be quoted of the Sussex as well as of the
Suffolk marsh-meadows; but for me the verses are spoiled by the
strangely apologetic tone which the poet assumed in speaking of the
local plants:
The few dull flowers that o'er the place are spread
Partake the nature of their fenny bed.
And so on. Did he think that his polite readers expected to hear of
sweet peas and carnations beautifying the desolate mud-banks? The
"dulness" seems to be--well, not on the part of the flowers. "Dull as
ditchwater," they say. But ditchwater flowers are far from dull.
Of Sussex marshes the most extensive are the Pevensey Levels; but the
most pleasantly situated are those that lie just south of Lewes, where
the valley of the Ouse widens into an oval plain before it narrows
again towards Newhaven. From the central part of this alluvial basin the
view is very striking all around; for the estuary seems to be everywhere
enclosed, except to seaward, by the great smooth slopes of the chalk
Downs. On its west side are three picturesque villages, Iford, Rodmell,
and Southease, with churches and farms lying on the very verge of the
"brooks": at the head, the quaint old houses and castle of Lewes rise
conspicuous like a mediaeval town.
But to whichever of these watery wastes the flower-lover betakes
himself, he will not lack for occupation. One of the first friends to
greet him in the early summer, by the Lewes levels, will be the charming
_Hottonia_, or "water-violet," as it is misnamed; for though the petals
are pink, its yellow eye and general form proclaim it to be of the
_primulaceae_, and "water-primrose" should by preference be its title.
There are few prettier sights than a company of these elegant flowers
rising clear above the surface, their slender stems bearing whorls of
the pink blossoms, while the dark green featherlike leaves remain
submerged. This "featherfoil," as it is sometimes called, is as lovely
as the primrose of the woods.
Companions or near neighbours of the _Hottonia_ are the arrow-head, at
once recognized by its bold sagittate leaves, and the frog-bit, another
flower of three white petals, whose small reniform foliage, floating on
the brooks, gives it the appearance of a dwarf water-lily. By no means
common, but growing in profusion where it grows at all, the dainty
little frog-bit, once met with, always remains a favourite. The true
water-lilies, both the white and the yellow, are also native on the
levels; so, too, is the quaint water-milfoil, with its much-cut
submerged leaves resembling those of the featherfoil, and its numerous
erect flower-spikes dotting the surface of the pools. All these
water-nymphs may be seen simultaneously blossoming in June.
More prominent than such small aquatics are the tall-growing kinds which
lift their heads two or three feet above the waters. Of these quite the
handsomest is the flowering rush (_butomus_), stately and pink-petaled;
among the rest are the two water-plantains (the lesser one rather
uncommon); the water-speedwell, a gross and bulky _veronica_ which lacks
the charm of its smaller relative the brook-lime; and the queer
mare's-tails, which in the midst of a running stream look like a number
of tiny fir-trees out of their element. The umbelliferous family is also
well represented. Wild celery is there; and the showy water-parsnip
(_sium_); the graceful tubular water-dropwort, and its big neighbour the
horse-bane, which in some places swells to an immense size in the centre
of the ditches. On the margin grows the pretty trailing money-wort, or
"creeping Jenny"; and with it, maybe, the white-blossomed brook-weed, or
water-pimpernel, which at first sight has more likeness to the
crucifers than to its real relatives the primroses, and is thus apt to
puzzle those by whom it has not previously been encountered.
Rambling beside these so-called brooks, which are mostly not brooks but
channels of almost stagnant water, one cannot fail to remark the
clannishness of many of the flowers: they grow in groups, monopolizing
nearly the whole length of a ditch, and making a show by their united
array of leaves or blossoms. In one part, perhaps, the slim water-violet
predominates; then, as you turn a corner, a long vista of arrow-heads
meets the eye, nothing but arrow-heads between bank and bank, their
sharp, barbed foliage topping the surface in a phalanx: or again, you
may come upon fifty yards of frog-bit, a multitude of small green
bucklers that entirely hide the water; or a radiant colony of
water-lilies, whose broad leaves make the intrusion of other aquatics
scarcely possible, and provide a cool pavement for wagtail and moorhen
to walk on. It is noticeable, too, that the lesser water-plantain,
unlike the greater, is almost confined to one section of the levels; and
in like manner the brook-weed and the burmarigold have each occupied for
their headquarters the banks of a particular dike.
The fringed buckbean (_villarsia_) is said to be an inhabitant of these
brooks. I have not seen it there; but it may be found, sparsely, in the
river Ouse, a short distance above Lewes, where its round leaves float
on the quiet backwaters like those of a large frog-bit or a small
water-lily, though the botanists tell us it is a gentian. I remember
that on the first occasion when I saw it there, on a late summer day,
there was only a single blossom left, and as that was on a deep pool,
several yards from the bank, there was no choice but to swim for it. The
great yellow cress (_nasturtium amphibium_), a glorified cousin of the
familiar water-cress, is also native on the Ouse above Lewes, less
frequently below.
More spacious than the Lewes levels, but drearier, and on the whole less
interesting, are those of Pevensey, which cover a wide tract to the east
of Hailsham, formerly an inlet of the sea, where the sites of the few
homesteads that rise above the flat meadows, such as Chilley and
Horse-eye, were once islands in the bay. Walking north from Pevensey, by
a road which traverses this inhospitable flat, one sees the walls of
Hurstmonceux Castle in front, on what was originally the coast-line; on
either side of the highway is a maze of ditches and dikes, among which
rare flowers are to be found, notably the broad-leaved pepperwort, the
largest and most remarkable of its family, and the great spearwort, said
to be locally plentiful near Hurstmonceux. The bladderwort, reputed
common on these marshes, seems to have become much scarcer than it was
twenty years back.
For other flowers, other fenny tracts may be sought; Henfield Common,
for instance, has the bog-bean, the marsh St. John's-wort, and still
better, the marsh-cinquefoil. But of all Sussex water-meadows with which
I am acquainted the richest are the Amberley Wild Brooks, which lie
below Pulborough, adjacent to the tidal stream of the Arun, a piece of
partially drained bog-land which in a wet winter season is apt to be
flooded anew, and to revert to its primitive state of swamp. It is a
glorious place to wander over, on a sunny August afternoon, with the
great escarpment of the Downs, and the ever-prominent Chanctonbury Ring,
close in view to the south; and in a long summer day the expedition can
be combined with a visit to Arundel Park, only three miles distant, the
best of parks, as being the least parklike and most natural, and having
a goodly store of the wildflowers that are dwellers upon chalk hills.
The Amberley Wild Brooks possess this great merit, that in addition to
most of the aquatics and dike-land plants above-mentioned, they present
a fine display of the tall riverside flowers. Their wet hollows that
teem with frog-bit, arrow-head, water-parsnip, water-plantain, yellow
cress, glaucous stitchwort, and other choice things, are fringed here
and there with purple loosestrife, and with marsh-woundwort almost equal
to the loosestrife in size and colour; and mingling with these in like
luxuriance are yellow loosestrife, tansy, toadflax, and water-ragwort--a
brilliant combination of purple flowers and gold. Then, as if the
better to set off this spectacle, there is in some places a background
of staid and massive herbs like the great water-dock,
And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep green
As soothe the dazzled eye with sober sheen.[3]
One would fear that this wealth of diverse hues might even become
embarrassing, were it not that the heart of the flower-lover is
insatiable.
[Footnote 3: From Shelley's short lyric, "The Question," perhaps the
most beautiful flower-poem in the language.]
IV
LIKENESSES THAT BAFFLE
Stay, stand apart; I know not which is which.
_The Comedy of Errors._
ONE of the first difficulties by which those who would learn their
native flora are beset is the likeness which in some cases exists
between one plant and another--not the close resemblance of kindred
species, such as that found, for instance, among the brambles or the
hawkweeds, which is necessarily a matter for expert discrimination, but
the superficial yet often puzzling similarity in what botanists call the
"habit" of wildflowers. Thus the horse-shoe vetch may easily be
mistaken, by a beginner, for the bird's-foot trefoil, or the field
mouse-ear chickweed for the greater stitchwort; and the differences
between the dove's-foot crane's-bill and the less common _geranium
pusillum_ are not at first sight very apparent. Distinguishing features
instantly recognized by an expert, who has taken, so to speak,
finger-tip impressions of the plants, do not readily present themselves
to the layman, whose only guide is the general testimony of structure,
colour, and height.
It is, moreover, unfortunate that some of the popular flower-books,
owing to the slovenly way in which their descriptions are worded, are of
little help; they not only fail to give the needed particulars where
there is a real likeness, but often, where there is none, create
confusion in the reader's mind by depicting quite dissimilar plants in
almost identical terms. In Johns's _Flowers of the Field_ (edition of
1908), for example, the description of hedge-woundwort hardly differs
verbally from that of black horehound, and might certainly mislead a
novice who was studying hedgerow flowers. The same writer had an
exasperating habit of repeatedly stating that various plants are "well
distinguished" by certain features, when in fact it is very difficult,
from the accounts given by him, to distinguish them at all!
An earlier and better writer, Anne Pratt, did make an effort in her
_Haunts of the Wild Flowers_ to indicate the chief characteristics, as
between the sea-plantain and the sea-arrowgrass, the hemp-agrimony and
the valerian; but even she, when some of the labiate flowers were in
question, dismissed them, not very helpfully, as "all growing in
abundance, but so much alike that it needs a knowledge of botany to
distinguish them from each other"! I have known a case where, owing to a
picturesque but inaccurate account, in the same book, the Welsh
stonecrop (_sedum Forsterianum_) was confused with the marsh St.
John's-wort, which has leaves that bear a curious resemblance to those
of the _sedum_ tribe.
Even writers of botanical handbooks seem not to realize with what
difficulties the uninitiated are faced, in regard to certain groups of
plants where the several species, though quite distinct, bear a strong
family likeness. The chamomiles, for instance, might well receive some
special treatment in books; for it is no simple matter to assign their
proper names to some four or five of the clan--the true chamomile, the
wild chamomile, the corn chamomile, the stinking chamomile, and the
"scentless" mayweed, which is _not_ scentless. Many of the umbellifers
also are notoriously difficult to identify; and among leguminous plants
there is a bewildering similarity between black medick, or "nonsuch,"
and the lesser clover (_trifolium minus_), which in turn is liable to be
confused with the popular hop-clover or with the slender and fairy-like
_trifolium filiforme_. "Small examples of _t. minus_," said a well-known
botanist, Mr. H. C. Watson, "are so frequently misnamed _t. filiforme_,
that I trust only my own eyes for it."[4] "As like as two peas" is a
saying which finds fulfilment in these and other examples.
[Footnote 4: _Flora of Surrey_, by J. A. Brewer, 1863.]
The clovers are indeed a perplexing family; and it is not surprising
that the identification of the "shamrock" has given cause for dispute.
Two of the smaller trefoils, for example, _trifolium scabrum_ and
_striatum_, so closely resemble each other that a novice fails to
appreciate the assurance given in the _Flora of Kent_ that they "can
very easily be separated." It is doubtless easy to separate one twin
from another twin, Dromio of Ephesus from Dromio of Syracuse, when once
you know how to do so; but until you have acquired that knowledge there
is material for a "comedy of errors." The majority of folk are much more
apt to confuse plants than to distinguish them: witness such names as
"fool's-parsley" and "fool's-watercress." Fools there are; yet anyone
who has spent time in studying wildflowers, with no better aid than that
of the popular books on the subject, will hesitate to pass judgment on
such folly; for as so good an observer as Richard Jefferies said: "If
you really wish to identify with certainty, and have no botanist friend
and no _magnum opus_ of Sowerby to refer to, it is very difficult indeed
to be quite sure."[5] We have to be thankful for small mercies in this
matter; and it may be recognized that in some cases--generally where the
similarity is _not_ great, as that between the strawberry-leaved
cinquefoil and the wild strawberry, or between the feverfew and the
scentless mayweed--the books occasionally give a word of advice to "the
young botanist." Nine times out of ten, however, that young fellow, or
perchance old fellow (for one may be young as a botanist, while by no
means young in years), must shift for himself; and doing so, he will
gradually learn by experience what a number of likenesses there are
among plants, and how many mistakes may be made before a sure
acquaintance is arrived at.
[Footnote 5: Essay on "Wild Flowers," in _The Open Air_.]
The name of "mockers" is sometimes given by gardeners to weeds that are
so like certain valued plants as to be easily mistaken for them; and in
the same way, in the search for wildflowers, one's attention is often
distracted, as, for instance, if one is looking for the spineless
meadow-thistle, the eye may be baffled by innumerable knapweed blossoms
of the same hue; the clustered bell-flower will feign to be the autumnal
gentian, its neighbour on the chalk downs; or the blossoms and leaves of
the purple saxifrage on the high mountains are aped by the ubiquitous
wild thyme.
Of all these likenesses the most perilous is that between the malodorous
ramsons, which have a very abiding smell of garlic, and the highly
esteemed lily of the valley. Hence a story which I once heard from the
affable keeper who presides over a wooded hill in Westmorland where the
lily of the valley abounds, and where visitors are permitted to pick as
many flowers as they like after payment of a shilling. Seeing a
gentleman busily engaged in gathering a large bunch of ramsons, the
keeper, suspecting error, asked him what he supposed himself to be
picking. "Why, lilies of the valley, of course," was the reply. When the
truth was explained, the visitor thanked the keeper cordially, and
added: "I was picking the flowers for my wife: but if I had brought her
a present of garlic she would have had something to say to me. I myself
have lost the sense of smell."[6]
[Footnote 6: So, too, had the poet Wordsworth; of whom William Morris,
who disliked the Wordsworthian cult, used to say, in explanation of such
antipathy: "The fellow couldn't smell."]
Likeness or unlikeness--it is all a matter of observation. To a
stranger, every sheep in the flock has a face like that of her fellows:
to the shepherd there are no two sheep alike.
V
BOTANESQUE
What is it? a learned man
Could give it a clumsy name.
Let him name it who can,
The beauty would be the same.
TENNYSON.
AMONG the difficulties that waylay the beginner must be reckoned the
botanical phraseology. We have heard of "the language of flowers," and
of its romantic associations; but the language of botany is another
matter, and though less picturesque is equally cryptic and not to be
mastered without study.