Country Life
By IAN NIALL WITH things in season all men should be content, although at times this is far from the case. On the other side of the picture there is no denying the delight we all find in discovering a primrose in December, or fruit blossom out of season. At the weekend I was crossing a moor with two friends, and we were descending into a gully to cross a boulder-strewn stream when we halted on seeing a tree in the distance, for the tree was simply laden with red berries. The rowan is surely very early,' remarked one of my companions, but he was mistaken. The leaf in the sunlight was not the delicate green of young rowan but the dark green of holly barely showing in the mass of berries. I had never seen holly berries so thick, and to think that they were quite ignored by birds that would have feasted upon them with delight in January! We ap- proached the tree and each of us picked a sprig, but holly out of season doesn't come up to a rose at Christmas.
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