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Call of the Wildflower

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<h2>XXIV</h2> <h3>COVES OF HELVELLYN</h3> I climbed the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn. Scott. So far I have spoken more of the Welsh mountain flowers than of those belonging to Lakeland; but the difference between the two districts, in regard to their respective floras, is not very great, and with a few exceptions the plants that are native on the one range may be looked for on the other. The Lloydia is found in Snowdonia only; and Wales can boast, not a monopoly, but a greater plenty of the moss-campion and the purple saxifrage. On the other hand, the Alpine lady's-mantle and the yellow mountain-saxifrage, both abundant in Cumberland, are absent from Carnarvonshire; and this is somewhat of a loss, for the common lady's-mantle, charming though it is, lacks the beauty of the Alpine, and the yellow saxifrages, as they hang from the rocks like a phalanx of tiny golden shields—each with bright petals and pale green sepals radiating from a central boss—are among the greatest ornaments of the fells.[Pg 172] Again, the lovely little bird's-eye primrose is a North-country plant which is not found in Wales; against which may be set, perhaps, that gem of the damp mosses on certain Welsh streamsides, the ivy-leaved bell-flower. More characteristic of Lakeland than of Snowdonia, though not peculiar to it, are those two very beautiful flowers, the one a child of the swamp, the other of the high pastures, the grass of Parnassus, and the mountain-pansy; and to conclude the list, the snow-saxifrage and the mountain-avens are about equally rare in both countries—the avens, indeed, is confined to one or two stations, where fortunately it is little known. Helvellyn, as a mountain, is very inferior to Snowdon, nor indeed can it compete in grandeur with its own Cumbrian neighbours, the Great Gable and Scafell; but among visitors to the Lakes it has nevertheless an enduring reputation, largely due to the poems in which Scott and Wordsworth have sung its praises. Accordingly, during the tourist season, the anxious question: "Is that Helvellyn?" may often be overheard; and on a fine day all sorts of incongruous persons may be seen making their way up the weary slopes that lead from Grasmere to its crest. I once observed a gentleman in a top-hat toiling upward in the queue; on another occasion I witnessed at the summit a violent quarrel between a married couple, the point of dispute (on which they appealed to me) being whether their little dog[Pg 173] was, or was not, in danger of being blown over the cliffs. As the west wind was certainly very strong, and Helvellyn had already been associated with the story of a dog's fidelity, I ventured to advise a retreat. On the east side, however, where its "dark brow" overlooks the Red Tarn, and throws out two great lateral ridges—on the right, in De Quincey's words, "the awful curtain of rock called Striding Edge," and Swirrel Edge on the left—Helvellyn is a very fine mountain, and what is more to the present purpose, is botanically the most interesting of all the Lakeland fells. From Grisedale Tarn to Keppelcove, a distance of full three miles, that great escarpment, with the several "coves" that nestle beneath it, is the home of many rare Alpine flowers, corresponding in that respect with the Welsh rock-faces of Idwal and Cwm Glas; and though it does not offer so conspicuous a display, or such keen inducements to flower-gazing, a search along its narrow ledges, and under the impending crags, home of the hill fox, will seldom disappoint the adventurer. Some years ago I spent a week of July, in two successive seasons, at Patterdale, for the purpose of becoming better acquainted with the mountain flowers, but on both occasions the weather was very stormy and made it difficult to be on the fells. At first I searched chiefly under Striding Edge and the steep front of Helvellyn, among the rocks that[Pg 174] lie behind the Red Tarn, and in similar places above Keppelcove Tarn in the adjoining valley, hoping with good luck to light on the snow-saxifrage. In this I was unsuccessful; but I twice found a plant I had not hitherto met with—in appearance a small spineless thistle, with a cluster of light-purple scented flowers—which proved to be the Alpine saw-wort, or Saussurea, and which in later years I saw again on Snowdon. A blossom which I picked and kept for several months was so little affected by its separation from the parent stem that it continued its vital processes in a vase, and passed from flowering to seeding without interruption. Like the orpine, it was a veritable "live-long," or as the politicians say, "die-hard." At Patterdale I was so fortunate as to make the acquaintance of Mr. Robert Nixon, a resident who has had a long and intimate knowledge of the local flora; and he very kindly devoted a day to showing me some of his flower-haunts on Helvellyn. In the course of this expedition, one of the pleasantest in my memory, a number of interesting plants were noted by us: among them the mountain-pansy; the cross-leaved bedstraw; the vernal sandwort; the Alpine meadow-rue; the moss-campion; the purple saxifrage, now past flowering; the mountain willow-herb (epilobium alsinifolium), not the true Alpine willow-herb, but a native of similar places among the higher rills; and the salix herbacea, or "least willow," the smallest of British trees, which[Pg 175] when growing on the bare hill-tops is not more than two inches in height, though in the clefts of rock at the edge of the main escarpment we found it of much larger size. The moss-campion (silene acaulis) is especially associated with the locality of which I am speaking—the neighbourhood of Grisedale Tarn—and is mentioned in the "Elegiac Verses," composed by Wordsworth "near the mountain track that leads from Grasmere through Grisedale": There cleaving to the ground, it lies, With multitude of purple eyes, Spangling a cushion green like moss. To this the poet added in a note: "This most beautiful plant is scarce in England. The first specimen I ever saw of it, in its native bed, was singularly fine, the tuft or cushion being at least eight inches in diameter. I have only met with it in two places among our mountains, in both of which I have since sought for it in vain." The other place may have been the hill above Rydal Mount; for a contributor to the Flora of the Lake District states that it was there shown to him by Wordsworth. The poet's knowledge of the higher mountains, and of the mountain flora, was not great. The moss-campion though local, is much less rare than he supposed, and its "cushions" grow to a far larger bulk than that of the one described by him. In his Holidays on High Lands (1869),[Pg 176] Hugh Macmillan, paying tribute to the beauty of this flower, remarks that "a sheet of it last summer on one of the Westmorland mountains measured five feet across, and was one solid mass of colour." I have seen it approaching that size in Wales. Another plant which I was anxious to see was the Alpine cerastium (mouse-ear chickweed), said to grow "sparingly" on the crags of Striding Edge and in a few other places. I failed to find it; but when Mr. Nixon had pointed out to me, in a photograph of the Edge, a particular crag on which he had noticed the flower in a previous summer, I determined to renew the search. This the weather prevented; but in the following year, happening to be in Borrowdale in June, I walked from Keswick to the top of Helvellyn, and thence descended to Striding Edge, where, on the very rock indicated by Mr. Nixon, I found the object of my journey—not yet in flower, for I was somewhat ahead of its season, but authenticated as cerastium alpinum by the small oval leaves covered with dense white down. I have several times seen, high up on Carnedd Llewelyn, a form of cerastium with larger flowers than the common kind; this I think must have been what is called c. alpestre in the Flora of Carnarvonshire; but the true alpinum, though frequent in the Scottish highlands, is decidedly rare in Wales. Even when the summer is far spent, there is hope for the flower-lover among these mountains, especially[Pg 177] if he penetrate into one of those deep fissures—more characteristic of the Scafell range than of Helvellyn—known locally as "gills": I have in mind the upper portion of Grain's Gill, near the summit of the Sty Head Pass, where, on an autumn day, one may still see, on either bank of the chasm, a goodly array of flowers. Most prevalent, perhaps, are the satiny leaves of the Alpine lady's-mantle, which is extraordinarily abundant in this part of the Lake District, and forms a thick green carpet on many of the slopes. Against this background stand out conspicuously tall spires of golden-rod, rich cushions of wild thyme, and clumps of white sea-campion, a shore plant which, like thrift, sea-plantain, and scurvy-grass, seems almost equally at home on the heights. There, too, are the mountain-sorrel, and rose-root; butterworts, with leaves now faded to a sickly yellow; tufts of harebell, northern bedstraw and hawkweed; stout stalks of angelica; and, best of all, festoons of yellow saxifrages, beautiful even in their decay.[Pg 178] <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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