t. Only a lagging few, the
slight-throated blue-bell, the uncouth ragwort, the little, tight
scabious, remain. At least, the berries are here, however. While each
red hip shows where a faint rose blossomed and fell; while the elder
holds stoutly aloft her flat, black clusters; while the briony clasps
the hawthorn-hedge, we cannot complain. Not only the _main_ things of
Nature, but all her odds and ends, are so exceedingly fair and daintily
wrought.

It is one of those days that look charming, when seen through the
window; bright and sunny, with lights that fly, and shadows that pursue;
but it is a very different matter when one comes to _feel_ it. There is
a bleak, keen wind, that sends the clouds racing through the heavens,
and that blows right in our teeth; nearly strangling me by the violence
with which it takes hold of my head.

There has been no rain for a week or two, and it is a chalky country.
The dust is waltzing in white whirlwinds along the road. High up as we
are, it reaches us, and thrusts its fine and choking powder up our
noses.

"I suppose," say I, doubtfully, looking up at the shifting uncertainty
of the heavens, and trying to speak in a sprightly tone, a feat which I
find rather hard of accomplishment, with such a blast cutting my eyes,
and making me gasp--"I suppose that it will not rain!"

"_Rain!_ not it!" replies our coachman, with contemptuous cheerfulness.

"The glass was going down!" I say, humbly, "and I think I felt a drop
just now!"

"_Impossible!_ it _could_ not rain with this wind."

He says this with such a jovial and robust certainty of scorn, that I am
half inclined to distrust the sky's evidence--to disbelieve even in the
big drop that so indisputably splashed into my eye just now. "But in
case it _does_ rain," continue I, pertinaciously, "I suppose that there
is a house near, or some place where we can take refuge?"

"No, there is no house nearer than a couple of miles"--making the
statement with the easiest composure--"but it will not rain."

"Perhaps"--say I, with a sinking heart--"there is a wood--trees?"

"Well, no, there is not much in the way of trees--except Scotch
firs--there are plenty of them--it is a bare sort of place--that is the
beauty of it, you know"--(with a tone of confident pride)--"there is a
monstrously fine view from it!--one can see _seven_ counties!"

"Yes," say I, faintly, "so I have heard!"

At this point, the old gentleman is understood to be ba