little red bulbs, by which the plant propagates. Both the
viviparous grass and the polygonum are found in England. In fact, a
very large proportion of Alpine plants occur in parts of the British
islands (a legacy from the glacial period), though many which are
abundant in Switzerland are rare and local here.

At a lower level, in the woods, we come upon other plants, not really
"Alpine" at all, but of great and special beauty. We found four kinds
of winter-green (_Pirola_), one with a very large, solitary flower,
white and wax-like, and the beautiful white butterfly-orchid with
nectaries three quarters of an inch long, and other large-flowered
orchids. We were anxious to find the noble Martagon lily, and hunted
in many glades and forest borders for it. At last, concealed on a bank
in a wood, between Glion and Les Avants, it revealed itself in
quantity, many specimens standing over three feet in height. Martagon
is an Arabic word, signifying a Turkish cap. A very strange and
uncanny-looking lily, which I had never seen before, turned up near
Kandersteg at the Blue Lake, beloved of Mr. H. G. Wells. This is "the
Herb Paris." It has four narrow outstretched green sepals, and four
still narrower green petals, eight large stamens, and a purple seed
capsule. Its broad oval leaves are also arranged in whorls of four.
Its name has nothing to do with the "ville lumiere," nor with the
Trojan judge of female beauty, but refers to the symmetry and "parity"
of its component parts. I was not surprised to find that "the Herb
Paris" is poisonous, and was anciently used in medicine. It looks
weird and deadly.

Marmots, glacier fleas (spring-tails, not true fleas), admirable
trout, and burbot (the fresh-water cod, called "lote" in French),
outrageous wood-gnats, which English people call by a Portuguese name
as soon as they are on the Continent, and singing birds (usually one
is too late in the season to hear them) were our zoological
accompaniment. There were singularly few butterflies or other insects,
probably in consequence of the previous wet weather.

_July, 1909_

CHAPTER III

GLETSCH

Varied and uncertain as the weather was in Switzerland during July of
the year 1910, it showed a more decided character when I returned
there at the end of August. For three weeks there was no flood of
sunshine, no blazing of a cloudless blue sky, which is the one
condition necessary to the perfection of the beauty of Swiss
mountain