Next he picked a corn buttercup; the flowers were much smaller than the
great buttercups which grew in the meadows, and these were not golden but
coloured like brass. His foot caught in a creeper, and he nearly
tumbled--it was a bine of bindweed which went twisting round and round
two stalks of wheat in a spiral, binding them together as if some one had
wound string about them. There was one ear of wheat which had black
specks on it, and another which had so much black that the grains seemed
changed and gone leaving nothing but blackness. He touched it and it
stained his hands like a dark powder, and then he saw that it was not
perfectly black as charcoal is, it was a little red. Something was
burning up the corn there just as if fire had been set to the ears. Guido
went on and found another place where there was hardly any wheat at all,
and those stalks that grew were so short they only came above his knee.
The wheat-ears were thin and small, and looked as if there was nothing
but chaff. But this place being open was full of flowers, such lovely
azure cornflowers which the people call bluebottles.
Guido took two; they were curious flowers with knobs surrounded with
little blue flowers like a lady's bonnet.
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