COUNTRY LIFE
WE shall see—perhaps are now seeing—harvest, scenes in July. On early lands—for the soileas surely as the latitude affects the date—a good deal of grain is already ripe, and everywhere the colour has changed. The hymn-writer who described fields whitening unto harvest must have been thinking in terms of oats, the only grain that grows white as it ripens, It is perhaps the most beautiful of the grains in individual form and structure ; and in a good, many districts towards the North greatly pre- vails ; but-in England we think of harvest as golden. Wheat is our corn as surely as maize is corn in America. A field of wheat " shifting the light anew " in a sunny breeze has no rival among other grains, at any rate in colour. All the grain crops promise an abundant yield ; and though many have been grievously laid by storms, the more, modern varieties are " stand-Ups " in structure and have resisted well. I came across one field of rye in Norfolk that was immensely tall, but had remained quite upright after a windy deluge.
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