. The New Forest . one of the perfume of apricots,ripened on a warm garden-wall, as they used toripen in the old days; but now, alas! so seldomhave the summers heat enough to bring them toperfection that few people try to grow apricots outof doors. Now, in the sweet o the year, when the forestis gloriously clad in its gold and green livery, itseems quite a sin to stay indoors on such a morn-ing, so let us seek a favourite corner, screened bythe cedar-tree and bushes of rhododendron, alsoa mass of pale lilac and crimson bloom. The airis musical with a soft hum of the many insectswhich love the
. The New Forest . one of the perfume of apricots,ripened on a warm garden-wall, as they used toripen in the old days; but now, alas! so seldomhave the summers heat enough to bring them toperfection that few people try to grow apricots outof doors. Now, in the sweet o the year, when the forestis gloriously clad in its gold and green livery, itseems quite a sin to stay indoors on such a morn-ing, so let us seek a favourite corner, screened bythe cedar-tree and bushes of rhododendron, alsoa mass of pale lilac and crimson bloom. The airis musical with a soft hum of the many insectswhich love the honey of the rhododendron flower—large and small bumble-bees, hive-bees, the bee-hawk moth, and now and then a peacock, sulphur,or tortoise-shell butterfly, spread out their ex-quisitely-painted wings close to me, and settle fora moment or two on one of the globes of wafts of scent are in the air, blown acrossfrom the field ; and it is sometimes the sweet-brier FLOWER OF THE GORSE, FROM PARKHILL MAY 43 close by, or the delicate scent of the rhododendronflowers, and now again the rich, all-pervading odourof the sun-kissed gorse, of which one is most con-scious. Soon two cuckoos were answering oneanother from tree to hedge; a yaffingale, withhis long-drawn, laughing cry, crossed the meadowin loops of flight, the green, iridescent sheen of hisplumage, and the ruby of his head seeming to glowas he shot across the sunlight. A lark was pouringout his hurried song high up in the dazzling lightfluttering and fluttering ever higlier; then, sud-denly ceasing, he dropped down into the middleof the long grass. It was by watching several ofthese precipitate descents, always into the samespot, that I at length found my way to his nest,in a hole that a cows hoof had made when thesoil was soft after autumn rains, and all round thishole the grass grew very green and thick. ThereI watched the little birds growing bigger andgetting fledged, while the days grew nearer for theg
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookidnewforest00r, bookyear1904
