The heavy rains which have done so much harm to the standing corn have at least had the effect of making the country look greener and lovelier than I have seen it look for many seasons. There is now a fresh verdure about the upland pastures and pine woods which almost reminds one of the deep valleys of the Bernese Oberland in early spring. Last year's continuous wet weather gave the trees and grass a miserable draggled appearance; but this summer's rain, coming after a dry spring, has brought out all the foliage in unwonted luxuriance; and everybody (except the British farmer) agrees that we have never seen the country look more beautiful. Though the year is now so far advanced, the trees are still as green as in springtide; and the meadows, with their rich aftermath springing up apace, look almost as lush and fresh as they did in early June. Londoners who get away to the country or the seaside this month will enjoy an unexpected treat in seeing the fields as they ought to be seen a couple of months sooner in the season. Here, on the edge of the down, where I have come up to get a good blowing from the clear south-west breeze, I have just sat down to rest myself awhile and to admire the view, and have reverted for a moment to my old habit of snail-hunting. Years ago, when evolution was an infant--an infant much troubled by the complaints inseparable from infancy, but still a sturdy and vigorous child, destined to outlive and outgrow its early attacks--I used to collect slugs and snails, from an evolutionist standpoint, and put their remains into a cabinet; and to this day I seldom go out for a walk without a few pill-boxes in my pocket, in case I should happen to hit upon any remarkable specimen. Now here in the tall moss which straggles over an old heap of stones I have this moment lighted upon a beautifully marked shell of our prettiest English snail. How beautiful it is I could hardly make you believe, unless I had you here and could show it to you; for most people only know the two or three ugly brown or banded snails that prey upon their cabbages and lettuces, and have no notion of the lovely shells to be found by hunting among English copses and under the dead leaves of Scotch hill-sides. This cyclostoma, however,--I _must_ trouble you with a Latin name for once--is so remarkably pretty, with its graceful elongated spiral whorls, and its delicately chiselled fretwork tracery, that even naturalists (who have perhaps, on the whole, less sense of beauty than any class of men I know) have recognised its loveliness by giving it the specific epithet of _elegans_. It is big enough for anybody to notice it, being about the size of a periwinkle; and its exquisite stippled chasing is strongly marked enough to be perfectly visible to the naked eye. But besides its beauty, the cyclostoma has a strong claim upon our attention because of its curious history.