Page:Life of Octavia Hill as told in her letters.djvu/118

must have been! Do you know I am to teach all the classes this autumn, except singing, (all is not many reading, writing and arithmetic). The ladies are all going out of town … Do you know I so enjoyed my visit to Weybridge last April. I have never enjoyed a visit there so much. I enjoyed the riding so, and how beautiful the country is! … (Of a visit to Buckinghamshire she writes): You know there are acres and acres and acres of beech woods, valleys and hills clothed and covered with them, and there are rounded hills with most beautiful slopes; and from little cleared spaces in the woods one catches a glimpse of far off purple hills, and nearer hills covered with wood, and farm-houses with their great barns golden-roofed, with lichen lying in a sheltered hollow; and the great bare head of some uncovered hill, cut with clear outline against the sky; and then perhaps we plunged into the depths of the woods again, where the sunlight fell between the fan-like branches of the beeches and thro' their leaves like a green mist, on to the silver stems, and on to the ground russet with last year's fallen leaves, perhaps upon the crest of some tall fern, or upon a sheet of blue speedwells, or on some little wood sorrel plant, or a grey tree stump, touched with golden lichen, or gold-green moss. And then the larks, cuckoos, and nightingales seemed hardly to stop by night or day, but kept up a glad sweet chorus.—The classes will be over in a minute, and then I must go. Forgive this short letter. I will try to write more next time. I often think of you, dear dear little Flo, and love to see "Loke" at the beginning of a letter. It is your own name, and no one else uses it, so it always reminds me of you.