51�Թ�

Toward the edge of the wood, where the ground became open and sloped down to an old fence and a brambly ditch beyond, only a few fading patches of pale yellow still showed among the dog’s mercury and oak-tree roots.

Blackberry was about to reply when another rabbit came noisily through the thick dog’s mercury in the wood, blundered down into the brambles and pushed his way up from the ditch.

But as will happen in gardens, other plants grew there—dog’s mercury and Jack-in-the-hedge—and they tended to overtake the plants Emma loved.

So occasionally she hired someone to pull up the dog’s mercury and the Jack-in-the-hedge so that her favorites could flourish.

“Oh, a very common plant—dog’s mercury.”