To-day, for instance, as they walked along, Mrs. Pryor talked to her companion about the various birds singing in the trees, discriminated their species, and said something about their habits and peculiarities. English natural history seemed familiar to her. All the wild flowers round their path were recognized by her; tiny plants springing near stones and peeping out of chinks in old walls--plants such as Caroline had scarcely noticed before--received a name and an intimation of their properties. It appeared that she had minutely studied the botany of English fields and woods. Having reached the head of the ravine, they sat down together on a ledge of gray and mossy rock jutting from the base of a steep green hill which towered above them. She looked round her, and spoke of the neighbourhood as she had once before seen it long ago. She alluded to its changes, and compared its aspect with that of other parts of England, revealing in quiet, unconscious touches of description a sense of the picturesque, an appreciation of the beautiful or commonplace, a power of comparing the wild with the cultured, the grand with the tame, that gave to her discourse a graphic charm as pleasant as it was unpretending.

Today, for instance, as they walked along, Mrs. Pryor talked about the various birds singing in the trees, and described their species and habits. English natural history seemed familiar to her. She recognised all the wild flowers, even tiny plants peeping out of chinks in old walls - plants such as Caroline had scarcely noticed before. At the head of the ravine, they sat down together on a ledge of mossy rock. Mrs. Pryor looked round, and spoke of the neighbourhood as she had once seen it long ago. She described its changes, comparing it to other parts of England with a sense of the picturesque, and an appreciation of the beautiful and commonplace, that gave her discourse a charm as pleasant as it was unpretending.
