"So am I, auntie," laughed Nell. "The sight of all the nice things is too much. Let us go away and pick some wild-flowers till the others come back, eh, auntie?"

"But, how can we leave the things here?" questioned the other. "Suppose some stranger, pa.s.sing by, should take a fancy to our nice luncheon?

What a terrible thing it would be to come back and find it gone! Again, too, just think, your friends the rabbits, dearie, might take it into their comical little heads to play at hide-and-seek amongst the dishes, besides nibbling what they liked. How would you like that, eh?"

"Oh, auntie, how funny you are!" cried Nell, quite overcome at the idea of the bunnies making a playground of their well-arranged table-cloth.

"But you can trust Rover to guard everything safely if we go away."

"Are you sure, dearie?" inquired her aunt. "Quite sure?"

"Certain, auntie, dear, n.o.body would dare to come near the spot while he's here, for he'd pretty soon bark, and bite, too! And, as for the poor rabbits, one sniff of his would send them all scuttling back into their burrows. Hi, Rover!" Nell called out, after giving this testimony on his behalf. "Lie down there, good dog, and watch!"

Rover at once c.o.c.ked an eye and looked in his young mistress's face.

Next, he took note of her pointed finger, which she waved in a sort of comprehensive curve embracing the table-cloth with its appetising display of eatables; and then, as if he had made a mental list of all left in his charge, he laid down in a couchant position at the head of the table, if such it could be called, with his nose between his paws, along which his eyes were ready to take aim at any intruder, saying, in their fixed basilisk stare, "Now, you just touch anything, if you dare, my friend. I should like to see you attempt it!"

"We can safely leave now, auntie," said Nellie; whereupon she and Mrs Gilmour strayed off through the bracken, hunting here and there for flowers on their way.

Almost the first thing to catch their sight, before indeed they had left the little turfy dell where their paraphernalia was spread out with Rover in charge, was the pretty rose-coloured blossom of the "ragged Robin," rising out of the gra.s.s. A little further off was a cl.u.s.ter of the lilac field madder, named after Sherard the eminent botanist, whose herbarium is still preserved at Oxford. This plant is one of a large family, numbering over two thousand varieties, from which the well-known dye, madder, is obtained, though, of late years, aniline colouring matter has somewhat depreciated its commercial value.

Mrs Gilmour presently picked up something better than either of these, at least in appearance. This was a little blue flower resembling the violet, with glossy green leaves that were its especial charm.

"I declare I've found a periwinkle!" she cried--"such a fine one too."

"Oh, let me look, auntie!" said Nell, peeping into her hand. "Dear me, do you call that a periwinkle?"

"Yes, dearie. Pretty, isn't it? It blooms all the year; and I've seen it down in Devonshire covering a s.p.a.ce of nearly half an acre with its leaves and blossoms. One of the poets, not Cowper my favourite, though one equally fond of the world of nature, describes the flower very nicely. 'See,' he says--

"'Where the sky-blue Periwinkle climbs E'en to the cottage eaves, and hides the wall And dairy lattice, with a thousand eyes!'"

"What pretty lines, auntie, so very like the flower!" cried Nell when Mrs Gilmour finished the quotation. "But, do you know, auntie, I thought when you said you'd found a periwinkle, you meant one to eat, like those periwinkles I've got in the aquarium you gave me."

"Did you really, though, dearie?" said her aunt, smiling at her very natural mistake. "It is because you feel hungry, I suppose. You may eat this one if you like!"

"No, no, auntie," laughed Nellie, "I'm not quite so hungry as that!

But, oh, auntie, here are some of those lovely big daisies we saw when we first came in the park."

"Those are the daisies that are called the 'ox-eye' or moon daisy, my dear," explained Mrs Gilmour. "You might call them the first cousins-- though only, mind you, a sort of poor relation--of the choice marguerite daisy that gardeners cultivate and think so highly of. Here, too, dearie, I see another old friend of mine, whose petals fall just like snow-flakes on the gra.s.s."

"It is almost like the honeysuckle," cried Nellie. "How sweet it smells!"

"Like its name, dearie," replied the other. "It is called the 'meadow- sweet'; and a delicious perfume can be extracted from it by infusion in boiling water. The roots of the plant are long tubers, which, when ground to powder and dried, may be used as a subst.i.tute for flour, should you have any scarcity of that article!"

"I'd rather have the real sort of flour, though, auntie."

"So would I, too, dearie," agreed Mrs Gilmour. "I only told you in case you may be thrown on a desert island some day, when the information might be of use in the event of your being without bread."

"But, supposing there was no meadow-sweet there either, auntie?"

"Sure that would be a bad look-out," said Mrs Gilmour, joining in Nell's laugh. "I think we'd better wait till you get to the desert island!"

Wandering along, they plucked at their will ma.s.ses of the wild convolvulus, or "great bindweed," whose white blossoms, while they lasted, added much to the general effect of the bouquet Nellie was making up with her busy fingers from the spoils of coppice and sward.

These, in addition to the flowers they had just picked, now comprised many other natives of the wood and hedgerow, such as the purple bugloss, the yellow iris, the star thistle, the common mallow; and, a convolvulus which was brilliantly pink, in contrast to his white brother before- mentioned. Besides these, Nellie had also gathered some sprays of the "toad flax" and "blue succory," a relative of the "endive" tribe, which produces the chicory-root so much consumed in England, as in France, as a "subst.i.tute" for coffee. A splendid sprig of yellow broom and dear little bunch of hare-bells, the "blue Bells of Scotland," with two or three scarlet poppies, a wreath of the aromatic ground ivy and some fern-leaves for foliage, completed her floral collection.

Stopping beneath a group of trees further on, to listen to the song of a thrush, which was so full of melody that they approached him quite close without his noticing them, Nell and her aunt were amused by seeing two rooks quarrelling over a worm which they had both got hold of at the same time, one at either end gripping the unfortunate creature; and gobbling, and tugging, and cawing, at once!

One of these rooks had a white head, which he seemed to c.o.c.k on one side in a strangely familiar way to Nell.

"He's just like the Captain!" she exclaimed, t.i.ttering at the fancied resemblance. "Look, auntie, why he actually seems to wink!"

"I declare I'll tell him!" said Mrs Gilmour, enjoying the joke none the less at the fancied resemblance. "Sure he'd be hoighly delighted."

Then, as they wound round back to the dell through the dense shrubbery, they re-crossed the little rivulet which they had twice pa.s.sed over before.

On the banks of this, although it was too small almost to have "banks,"

properly speaking, Mrs Gilmour pointed out to Nell the "great water plantain," with its sprigs of little lilac blossoms and beautiful green leaves, like those of the lily of the valley somewhat. The plant is said to be used in Russia as a cure for hydrophobia, the good lady explained; though she added that she could not vouch personally for its virtues.

Not far from this, too, they found another very curious plant, called in some places the "cuckoo pint," and in others the "wake robin," or, more commonly, "lords and ladies." The leaves of this are of a glossy dark- green and the flower very like the leaf; only, more curved and tinted inside, with a hue of pale buff that becomes pinkish at the extremities, the centre pistil being of the same colour. It belongs to the arum family.

Following the course of the brook, Nellie, a little way on, spied out a regular bed of the forget-me-not; when Mrs Gilmour told her the old legend connected with the flower.

How a knight and a lady were sitting by the side of a river; and, on the lady expressing a desire to have some of the bright blue blossoms "to braid in her bonny brown hair," the gallant knight at once dashed in the stream to gratify her wishes. He secured a bunch of the flowers; but, on turning to regain the sh.o.r.e, the current overcame him; and, as the old song goes--

"Then the blossoms blue to the bank he threw, Ere he sunk in the eddying tide; And 'Lady, I'm gone, thine own love true, Forget-me-not,' he cried.

"The farewell pledge the lady caught; And hence, as legends say, The flower's a sign to awaken thoughts Of friends who are far away!"

"How nice!" cried Nellie-- "How very nice!"

"Not for the poor knight, though," said her aunt. "However, here, dearie, is another plant not quite so romantic, the old brown scabious, or 'turf-weed.' It is a great favourite with bees, while its roots are supposed to have valuable medicinal properties, which the country people well know and estimate at their right worth. In some places they call it the 'Devil's bit'!"

"How funny!" interposed Nellie. "Why do they give it such a strange name?"

"Yes, it is rather a strange t.i.tle; but I read once somewhere that the story about it is, that the Spirit of Evil, envying the good which this herb might do to mankind, bit away part of it and thence came its name, 'Devil's bit.'"

"Really, auntie," said Nell. "Does it look as if it had been bitten?"

"Yes, the root does," she replied. "But, come, dearie, we must get back now as fast as we can, or Captain Dresser and the boys will be there before us and eat up all the luncheon!"

Without stopping to look at any more flowers or curious plants, they retraced their steps towards the dell, Nellie humming the last line of the song of the forget-me-not, which she was trying to learn by heart-- "Of friends who are far away! Of friends who are far away"--when, suddenly, they heard Rover's bark ringing through the woods, its echoes loud and resonant, like the sound of a deep-toned bell.

"Come on, dearie," called out Mrs Gilmour, who was in advance, quickening her pace as she spoke, "come on quick, dearie! There's some one making off with our lunch; and, just think how hungry we are!"

"Don't fear, auntie," said Nell rea.s.suringly behind her; "Rover will not let any one touch it, you may be certain!"

Nevertheless, she hurried after Mrs Gilmour; and both arrived together, well-nigh breathless, at the spot where they had left their feast so nicely laid out.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.