COTSWOLD BLOSSOMS.
We all know that the Cotswold villages, centred on that architectural marvel, Chipping Campden, are the most English thing in England. This June the country about them has an added glory. The seasons have met, have kissed hands, to the end of a more condensed blossoming than we often see. A motorist journeying by Chipping Campden, Tewkesbury and Upton-on-Severn, jotted down the shrubs he saw in flower, thus : chestnuts, white and pink ; may, white and pink ; elder, syringa ; lilac, white and mauve ; laburnum, wild roses. He might perhaps have added guelder, honeysuckle, gorse and broom, with several more. The blossoming is certainly more simultaneous than usual ; and in the garden it is wholly surprising to discover " red hot pokers" among peonies, lupins and delphiniums. A personal experience at the same date in Shropshire suggests that this year the North-west is early compared with the usually more precocious South and East. It has on the whole enjoyed better weather. Through- out the West the farms as well as the gardens are a treat to behold.
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