me who go through life with deaf ears and
blind eyes, and never hear or see what is all around them. The main
thing is to have enthusiasm, and then, it doesn't matter where your
home is, you'll manage to enjoy nature, even if it is only at
second-hand, from books."

"And there are always the holidays," said Adeline. "We went to
Switzerland last August, and I found twenty-seven different specimens
just in one walk."

"Before I came to St. Chad's," confessed Lettice, "I used to think
daisies were the flowers of grass, and not separate plants--I did
indeed!"

"You certainly know better now," laughed Miss Maitland. "We can get so
much pleasure from things when we have learnt even a very little about
them. Every leaf or blade of grass becomes a marvel, if we begin to
examine its structure, and look at it through the microscope. There is
nothing so wonderful as the book of nature, and it is always there,
ready to entertain us when we wish to read it."

It was much cooler and breezier up on the hills, though even there the
air had a sultry feeling, and a dull, heavy haze was creeping up from
the sea.

"It looks like thunder," said Miss Maitland. "I should not be surprised
if we were to have a storm to-night. We had better turn towards home
now; but we'll go back by the cliffs above Sandihove, instead of
through the woods."

It was rather a difficult matter to get the girls along, so many
interesting discoveries were made on the way--first a patch of
pink-fringed buck-bean, growing at the edge of the stream; then a clump
of butterfly orchis; and last, but not least, a quantity of the
beautiful "Grass of Parnassus", the delicate white blossoms of which
were starring the boggy corner of a meadow. Miss Maitland was kept
quite busy naming specimens, and everybody had a large bunch of
treasures to carry home. Janie Henderson and Adeline Vaughan, being the
two chief enthusiasts of the party, walked on either side of the
teacher, discussing matters botanical; and the others straggled in
little groups behind. Honor found herself walking with Lettice Talbot,
who was in a more than usually sprightly frame of mind, bantering and
teasing, and turning everything into fun.

"I've learnt the names of so many new flowers," she declared, "that I'm
sure I shall get a bad mark for history to-morrow. My brain is small,
and only capable of holding a certain amount. When fresh things are put
in, out go the old ones, or else I mix them comp