The yellow blossom of the Charlock is pretty, and the Poppy is the finest scarlet wild flower we have.  There is a third flower among the wheat to-day, the beautiful blue Corn Flower or Corn Bluebottle.  It is no more welcome to the farmer than the Poppy and the Charlock are.  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.

[Illustration left:  CREEPING FIELD THISTLE.]

[Illustration right:  FIELD SCABIOUS.]

[Illustration left:  EVERGREEN ALKANET.]

[Illustration center:  CORNFLOWER.]

[Illustration right:  SMALLER BINDWEED.]

[Illustration:  CHARLOCK.]

To us it is only a very beautiful flower.  The florets in the centre 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 wheat is cut; but some of it is near the gate to-day.  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 stems 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 Pimpernel.  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 Pimpernel differs from the Poppy in almost everything except its colour.  The Poppy has a tall stout stem and its blossoms are very large.  The Pimpernel trails on the ground and has tiny flowers.  The blossoms of the Poppy have four petals, those of the Pimpernel have five.  These are a beautiful scarlet, but not quite so bright a 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 sessile on the stem.  Turning a leaf over we find that on its under side are black or dark purple spots.