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I see in the fields and meadows the bird's foot trefoil, the oxeye daisy, the lady smocks, sweet hemlock, butterbur, the stitchwort, and the orchis, the "long purpled" of Shakespeare. By the margin of the pond the yellow iris hangs out its golden banners over which the dragon fly skims.

It is related to the coltsfoot of the arable fields, and the coltsfoot sends up a stalk without a leaf, and flowers before any green appears. So, too, the butterbur of the river flowers before its great leaf comes. Nothing is really common either, for everything is so local that you may spend years, and in fact a lifetime, in a district and never see a flower plentiful enough in another.

We passed the Hieland Line in the first hour; and now if we could but pass yon crooked water, we might cast our bonnets in the air." In Allan Water, near by where it falls into the Forth, we found a little sandy islet, overgrown with burdock, butterbur and the like low plants, that would just cover us if we lay flat.

The sunshine, the song of the water, the pleasant green grass, the white orchis, and the purplish stones were thereby rendered permanent to me. Such is the wonderful power of plants. To any one who takes a delight in wild flowers some spot or other of the earth is always becoming consecrated. There is, however, something curious about this butterbur.

Oh, the joyful place of streams! River and leat and back-water here ran clear among willow-clad islands, all fringed deep with meadow-sweet and comfrey and butterbur and melilot. The sun shone overhead among big, white, racing clouds; the fish poised in mysterious pools among trailing water-weeds; and there was soon no room in my heart for anything but the joy of earth and the beauty of it.

We passed the Hieland Line in the first hour; and now if we could but pass yon crooked water, we might cast our bonnets in the air." In Allan Water, near by where it falls into the Forth, we found a little sandy islet, overgrown with burdock, butterbur, and the like low plants, that would just cover us if we lay flat.