But what a year it was for seeing the fields! I must say it again even if you are tired of hearing it. You must not imagine squares of flowers, flat as pancakes, prim and orderly and uninviting such as you see in Holland. In Scilly no two fields are alike, and it is difficult to find one that is flat and uninteresting. They cover the slopes facing to the west and south; very often they run down almost to the edge of the sea, with only a low stone hedge to divide them from the shore. What would Wordsworth have felt, I wonder, to see these waves of dancing daffodils? Perhaps he would have preferred the scattered groups and clusters that spring up of themselves in the hedges by the wayside, or even on the beach itself. For the wise Scillonian soon discovers which of his bulbs are the best and most profitable; and, weeding out from his fields those that promise least, he “heaves them to cliff,” where, if they light on any sort of soil, and out of reach of the waves, they will blossom even at the water’s edge, till some unusually high tide washes them away. In the meantime they delight the eye of the passer-by with unexpected splashes of gold, drops from the gorgeous seas that cover the island-flanks. So lovely are the flowers that one would like to imagine the industry as “roses, roses all the way”; but of course that cannot be the case. Besides the drawbacks I have mentioned already--damage to crops from sudden storms, and gluts in the market from excess of supply--there are other risks to run. It has happened that in rough or foggy weather the off-islanders have sent quantities of flowers to St. Mary’s by the launch, and they have been duly stowed away in the hold of the “Lyonnesse.” The weather has got worse and worse, and it has been considered unsafe to make the journey to Penzance. But the flower-boxes are in the hold, and there they have to stay; and eventually they reach their destination on the mainland. By that time their contents are dead and worthless, and so the grower has lost his flowers, his time, and his trouble, and yet he must pay the carriage, and for the return of the empty boxes if he wants them. To any one who has paid a visit to Scilly during the flower-season, the always-welcome sight in the London streets of the first daffodils of the season will be more than ever welcome; for these children of the spring will recall the blue seas and sunny skies of the flower-islands where they were reared. V DESCRIPTIVE AND ARCHÆOLOGICAL How many islands are there? That is a difficult question to answer until we know how big a rock must be in order to be dignified with the name of island. One writer tells us there are over 300, another says nearly 200, a third has counted 140 on which grass will grow, and a fourth makes his estimate (how, I know not) as low as 17. Three hundred must include a great many “blynd rokkettes,” as the old chronicler Leland delightfully calls the little barren rocks.