Music Welcome to snoozecast, the podcast designed to help you fall asleep. Find us at snoozecast.com. And if you enjoy our show, please share us with a friend. This episode is brought to you by Pimpernoles and Pint Cushions. Tonight, we'll read about more wild flowers on the farm, including cornflowers and charlots in the hayfield from Flowers of the Farm, written by Arthur O. Cook and published in 1900. In the last episode of this series, which aired last week, we read about dandelions and common grasses that grow wild around British farmlands. Let's get cozy. Close your eyes. Relax your body into the softness of your bed.

Now, take a few deep breaths. Chapter 9 in the Cornfield.

One morning early in July, while we are having breakfast at Willow Farm, we ask Mr. Hammond if he thinks we shall find any flowers in his wheat field. The farmer laughs and says he hopes we shall not, but he is very much afraid that we shall. As we are here on purpose to look for flowers, we are glad to find them anywhere. Mr. Hammond thinks more about his crops than about flowers and does not care to see a single blossom in his corn, however pretty it may be. We are soon at the field, and there is no mistake about the flowers being there too. Close to the gate, where the wheat is not quite so thick as elsewhere. There is a splendid patch of scarlet poppies. This is perhaps the very brightest wild flower that we have. Some plants, as we have seen, are annuals, others are perennials, and annual only lives for one year. The plant springs up from the seed, grows through the summer, and in the autumn or the winter dies. A perennial lives for many years. The flowers fade and fall as those of annuals do. Even the leaves and stems may droop and die. The roots and lower part of the stem do not die. They live in the ground through the winter, and in the following year fresh stems appear. The white clover, which we found in ash-mead, is a perennial. The crimson clover is an annual. If you sowed a patch of your garden with poppy seed, you would have the flowers growing their year after year. You might therefore say, surely the poppy is a perennial. I only sowed the seed one year, yet the poppies appear again and again. That is because the plants sowed their own seed. The flowers faded, then the seed cases shed their seed upon the ground. Next spring the seeds produced fresh plants. Most annual wild flowers sow their own seed in this way, but we must not mistake them for perennials because year after year they grow in the same place. In your patch of garden you can easily prevent the poppies from growing more than one year if you wish to do so. All that is necessary is to pick off every flower before it fades. Then no seed will fall, and you will be rid of the poppies. Mr. Hammond might do the same, you think, if he wishes to rid his field of poppies. But you see, there are many poppies growing among the wheat all through the field. To get at each plant and cut off all the flowers would trample down the wheat and do more harm than good. All that the farmer can do is to have as many weeds as possible, hold up while the weed is young and short.

Even then, many more come up later in the spring.

The seeds of the poppy have no papis

like those of this old and some other plants.

They are not blown far away by the wind but fall close to the plant. There are, however, an immense number of very tiny seeds in each seed case. As we see by opening the round couple like case on a stem from which the flower has fallen. This great number of seeds adds to the difficulty of getting rid of poppies. We I am afraid are hardly sorry that the poppies are among the corn today. The glorious scarlet It give a rich fiery tint to the whole field. On a poppy plant close to the gate, there are several blossoms. Some of them are fully open. Some of them are still only buds. You see a difference between the open flowers and the buds at once. The open flowers stand upright on the stalk. The buds hang down. Here is a bud just opening. The green case, called the calyx, which contains the scarlet petals is already partly open.

It is splitting in half, and the flower will soon be out, then the calix will fall off. Here is a blossom from which the calix has just dropped. The four large scarlet petals, two of which are slightly larger than the other two, have lane inside all crumbled up, not neatly folded as is the case with most flowers. Yet, in a very short time after the calix has dropped off, the sap will flow into the petals and will smooth them out. They will be as glossy, smooth and shining as the other blossoms fully open on the plant. The brilliant poppy is more beautiful than useful to the farmer and the bees at any rate. Most flowers contain nectar, but the poppy has none at all. If the bees come to it, it is for the dusty yellow pollen to make into wax. The seed pods of some flowers open when ripe and the seeds fall out. In others, the pod or case does not open but wrots away. The poppy has a different way of scattering its seeds. There is a ring of tiny holes in the seed case and through these holes the seed is shaken out. The leaves are long, but vary a good deal in size and shape. The stems are covered with stiff and bristly hairs. Chapter 10 In the cornfield continued. Besides the poppies, there is charlock in the field. Not much, Mr. Hammond will be glad to know, for he has been trying for many years to get rid of this plant altogether. Pretty as the yellow blossoms of the charlock are, it is one of the most troublesome weeds which the farmer has to fight. It is only in annual, certainly, and each seed pod holds no more than six or seven seeds. The seeds, however, are oily, and this oiliness preserves them. If they are plough deep into the ground, they may live there for several years and will produce a plant when turned up again by the plough or the scuffle. Mr. Hammond tells me that some years ago this field was full of charlock, and in the early summer there would be more charlock

than wheat to be seen.

This is how we got rid of it.

Every year he plowed the field

and got it ready for the crop as early as possible.

Then the charlock sprang up before the crop of corn

or turnups was sewn, thus it could be rooted out. Still, as we see today, there is a little left, though it is growing less each year. Charlock is a wild mustard. There is more seed than blossom here today, for the flowering time for Charlock is in June. If we choose some seed from a pod, we shall find it hot and biting to the tongue. In some parts of england many farmers grow mustard as one of their crops. Near willow farms some farmers grow mustard as a catch crop. They sow it in autumn, as soon as another crop has been taken off the field.

In the spring it is eaten by sheep or else it is plowed in. A catch crop plowed in like this enriches the land. Moreover, a number of weeds are buried with the catch crop before the the F-time to blossom and to shed their seed. The yellow blossom of the charlotte is pretty, and the poppy is the finest scarlet wild flower we have. There is a third flower among the wheat today, the beautiful blue corn flower or corn blue bottle. It is no more welcome to the farmer than the poppy we have. The flower is a flower that we have. It is no more welcome to the farmer than the Pompey and the charlacar. It is a perennial and therefore difficult to get rid of. Moreover when we pull up a stem we find it quite hard work. It is so tough. These tough stems blunt the sickles of the reapers and the knives of the reaping machine. To us it is only a very beautiful flower. The florets in the center of each blossom are dark purple, but the outer ones are of a brighter blue. The leaves are long and narrow. Those near the bottom of the stem are rather broader than those higher up. The stems themselves are not round, but angular. We can feel corners or angles as we hold one in our hand. They are also covered with a kind of down. There is another flower which we shall see better if we come to the stubble field after the weed is cut. But some of it is near the gate today. This is the smaller bindweed. We see that it is a relation of the large bindweed in the garden hedge. It has leaves and flowers of the same shape, but the flowers are smaller and are pink and white. Those of the large bindweed are rarely anything but pure white. This is another troublesome weed here. It does not climb as the large bindweed does, but creeps along the ground, twining round everything it meets. In the potato field it is often even more troublesome than here. Corn is cut, but potatoes are dug out of the ground. The small bindweed forms such a thick carpet over the field and twines round the potato stem so closely that it is often very difficult to dig up the potatoes. Here is another little flower which I am glad to show you now, the Scarlet Pimpernal. This and the Poppy are the only Scarlet Wild Flowers we have. There are many pink and also many purple flowers, but only these two are really Scarlet. The pinprinol differs from the poppy and almost everything except its color. The poppy has a tall stout stem and its blossoms are very large. The pinprinol trails on the ground and has tiny flowers. The blossoms of the poppy have four petals. Those of the pimpernil have five. These are a beautiful scarlet, but not quite so bright as scarlet as those of the poppy. The leaves grow in pairs, and the small, bare stalks which carry a flower at their ends spring from the stem beside the leaves.

The leaves are sassile on the stem. Turning a leaf over, we find that on its underside are black or dark purple spots. The blossoms of the pimpernol close up when rain is near, and it is often called the poor man's weather-glass. Sometimes, but very rarely, a plant is found which has pink or even pure white blossoms. There is also a blue pimpernol. Pimpernol is the bog pimpernol, but we shall not find it in this dry field of corn, as you may guess by the name. One more flower we will look at, and then it will be time to leave our cornfield and to search elsewhere. going on the hedge bank at the side of the field is a pretty lilac blue flower on a long, bare stalk. It is the field scabious. The blossoms are in shape like a round ball, very much flattened like a round pin cushion. There are no large petals here, as with the poppy, but a great number of small florets. Those on the outer edge of the blossom are larger than those inside. Each floret is a tiny tube or pipe. The leaves are on and separate stalks from those which bear the flowers, and they grow in pairs. They are divided into several pairs of lobes, with a single lobe at the end of each leaf. Some leaves grow from that part of the stem which is underground, and these are larger than the

others, and are sometimes of a different shape. Both the leaves and the stem are hairy. Chapter 11 on the Chase We have now seen a good many flowers of the farm.

We have found them. 11 on the chase.

We have now seen a good many flowers of the farm. We have found them in the copus on the garden wall and in the fields. Today, we will go a little farther off three miles away. You say, surely that is a long way off for the farmer to have a field. It is not exactly a field. The chase is a great open common or more which belongs to the village or parish where Willow Farm is. Nearly all the people of If the village have certain rights of pastureage on it. They may let their horses and cattle and sheep graze there. Every now and then Mr. Hammond sends some of his sheep to the chase to feed there for a few weeks. It is very high, dry ground, and that is good for sheep. The road runs through the middle of the great common without any hedge or fence on either side. There are horses and sheep and cattle here on this may morning, donkeys too. All the sheep are marked, and we soon see some which belong to Willow Farm. They are stamped on the back in large letters, W-H, for William Hammond. A farmer easily knows his own horses and cows. Sheep are less easy to recognize and are usually marked. One of the flowers of the chase we see at once. In whatever direction we look across the common, there is a perfect blaze of gold, the blossoms of the prickly gorse or furs. Spring is the time to see its mass of golden yellow blossoms best, but I do not think there is a week or even a day in the whole year when some of the flowers are not out. Did you ever hear the saying, kissing is out of season when the gorse is out of bloom? That is, never. The gorse flowers are beautiful and their scent is sweet. As to gathering them, however, there is a terrible difficulty. The flowers grow among long, sharp spikes which cover the stems closely. You would almost as soon gather nettles. There are very few real leaves and they are small and not easily seen, but the thorns are beautiful to look at, if not to touch. They are such a rich, dark grain. Nor is gorse a useless plant. If the prickly stems are bruised or mashed a little, they form a fodder which animals like. Indeed, a pony near us seems to enjoy them as they are. He is tearing off and eating a piece after a piece from a gorse bush. His mouth must be less tender than ours. Later in the summer we visit the chase again to find some flowers that were not out in May. On our way, we pass a potato field in blossom, a very pretty sight. These blossoms are a pale-ish purple, but sometimes the potato flowers are white.

The hair bell is a flower which we shall now find on the chase. A great contrast to the stout and thorny bush of course. The hair bell's stem is almost as slender as a thread, although it stands upright. Each blossom is a dainty little blue bell of five petals. White blossoms are sometimes found, but not often. There are leaves as well as flowers on the stem. Growing from the lower part of the stem close to the ground, we may perhaps find some broader, rounder leaves. Perhaps not, however, for these lower leaves soon wither and die away. The hairbell loves to grow where there is fresh air. Here on the chase we are high up. It has been a long steep climb from Willow Farm and we are more than 500 feet above sea level. Far below us, a few miles away, we see a broad river on which steamers and sailing ships are passing up and down. Away to the west is the sea, from which a breeze is nearly always blowing across the chase. No wonder that the little hairbell loves this spot. We have found a yellow flower and a blue one on the chase, and now we have not far to look for something red. Here is a clump of a heath or a ling, and not far off a patch of heather, too. We must be careful to distinguish heath and heather. Let us look at the heath first. the heath as on as on the hairbell, we find bill-shaped flowers, but the blossoms of the heath are very small and grow from a tough woody stem. They are a reddish purple. On little side branches growing from the stems are the very tiny leaves. The whole plant is low, bushy, and spreading. The flowers of the heather are rather larger, deep crimson in color, and grow in clusters. On the flower stems grow very small narrow leaves. There are generally three of them together, and they do not grow so thickly as the leaves of heath. Among these leaves are some that are made of several leaflets. Gors, Heather, and Heath are spreading plants, and if they were allowed to grow unchecked, they would soon smother and destroy the turf. Every few years, therefore, the chase is burnt. In winter, spring both gorse and heath burn easily, the fire spreading fast from one patch to another. The smoke of the burning chase may then be seen for many miles away. When the fire has burnt out, the chase looks very black and dismal, but the roots and underground stems of both the hether and the gorse are still alive. Fresh shoots will grow, and soon the course will be golden in the spring. The heath purple in the summer, as they were before. Chapter 12 In the Lanes This is the last day that we can spend in looking for wildflowers at Willow Farm. Perhaps some of you already knew something about flowers before this visit? If so, you may have been disappointed that we have not seen some favorite flower of your own. You may think we have passed over many flowers which deserve to be noticed. For that matter, I think every wild flower deserves to be noticed, but we certainly should not have time for all. I showed you several plants growing on the walls and roof because it was interesting to see that quite beautiful flowers, such as the wall flower and the house leak, could grow with very little soil. We looked rather closely at the clovers and at the grasses in the hay field, because these plants are important to the farmer. They are part of his crops. Then too, we noticed several weeds which do him harm. Today I am going to take a kind of holiday. I shall show you three flowers, not because they have much to do with the farmer, but because they are great favorites of my own. None of these are very common at Willow Farm, although I know where to find each one. We will go first down the little stony lane which leads from near the Foldyard Gate to the cottages where the shepherd and the bay lift live. Here we We shall find the alkanet. It is a perennial, and it blossoms here, year after year. I only know one other place in the village where it grows. Like some other flowers we have seen, it is not really a native of England. It has a very beautiful blue blossom, a little like the the blossom of the forget me not, which perhaps you know. But the flower of the alcanet is of a deeper, richer blue. Here again, as with so many other flowers we have seen, the blossom is formed of the five with lobes of a corolla. In the center of each blue blossom is a small white spot. We saw that the poppy and the pimpernol were the only two true scarlet wildflowers of our fields. In the same way, there is There's only one other English wild flower, which has such a deep blue blossom as the alkanet. That is the borage, and the borage, like the alkanet, is not really a native of England. For a fine golden yellow flower, I do not know anything which can beat the dandelion. If we have not seen every wild flower which grows at Willow Farm, we have at any rate seen three which have the deepest and richest colors. Now for my next favorite, this time we go to the shady lane leading from Willough Farm to the church. That is the only place near here where I've seen the lesser periwinkle. There is also a larger periwinkle, very similar to my favorite here, except in size. To find the periwinkle in full flower, we should have to come in spring, but, though it is July now, we shall still find a blossom here and there, I hope. Even in winter, we might do so too. The lesser periwinkle has a blue flower, but the blue is a pale lilac blue. Here again the petals are really the five spreading lobes of the corolla. There is something curious about these lobes. They are of a peculiar irregular shape that is not easy to describe. They are not exactly pointed and they are not regular in shape. You could cut the petal of a buttercup into two equal parts. It would be almost impossible to do this with the lobes of the paraouinkel blossom. The leaves are dark green, glossy and pointed, and they grow in pairs. The leaves are evergreen, they do not fade and die in autumn. Some of the parouinkel stems are erect and are about 6 inches high. Others are creeping. It is only the erect stems which bear flowers. They do useful work even when they don't bear flowers, however, for they form fresh roots, as we have seen the stalks of some other plants do. In this way, the whole bank beside the lane has become covered with this pretty plant. The parawinkel is a comparatively small plant. The last flower, the fox glove, that we shall see at Willow Farm is quite different. It is a very tall plant. It is generally described as growing from 3 to 5 feet tall. But I have seen a stem of 8 or 9 feet. We shall find it growing on the hedge bank in little orchard, and it also often grows in woods. The fox glove is neither annual nor perennial, it is biennial. That is, a two-year's plant. If you sow fox glove seed, you have no flowers the first year, only a root, and a great bunch of leaves. In the second year, tall stems which bear the flowers will appear. In the autumn after it has flowered, the fox glove generally dies, though sometimes it may live for another year or even two. Fox Gloves of course will reproduce themselves by seed as annuals and perennials do. A glove for a fox that is the meaning of the name you perhaps say. No, it has nothing to do with a fox. Many years ago, nearly everyone believed in fairies. And the fairies were often called the good folk or good people. It is they and not the fox who were supposed to use the purple blossoms as a glove. If you say, Faux Glove, quickly, you will see how easily it comes to sound Faux Glove. So our last thought among the flowers is of the fairies in whose existence hardly anyone

believes today.