THE PLEASURES OF GARDENING. 



of his heart, the untutored savage binds his brow with the native flowers of his romantic 

 haunts, while in every country, in proportion as civilization and refinement advances, so 

 does a taste for their cultivation increase. It is for the love of a garden, that the most 

 powerful influence is exerted in attracting men to their homes, and for this very reason, 

 every possible encouragement that is given to promote a taste for ornamental gardening, 

 secures an additional guarantee for domestic felicity, and the unity, morality, and happi- 

 ness of the social circle. Nor must it be forgotten, that as a recreation it conduces mate- 

 rially to health, advances intellectual improvement, softens the manners, and .subdues the 

 tempers of men. 



Of all embellishments, flowers are the most beautiful, and man alone, of all the senti- 

 ent tribes, seems capable of deriving enjoyment from them. With infancy the love for 

 them commences; throughout the period of adolescence and youth, it continues unabated, 

 increasing with our years, and becoming a great and fertile source of comfort and gratifi- 

 cation in our declining days. No sooner does the infant walk, than its first employment 

 is to put a flower in the earth, and to remove it ten times a day, to wherever the sun 

 shines most favorably. In the care of his little plot of ground, the schoolboy is joyously 

 relieved from his studies, and loses all the anxious cares and thoughts of his tasks, or the 

 home he may have left. In manhood, our attention is generally occupied with more active 

 duties, or, by more imperious, and may be, less innocent pursuits; still a few hours em- 

 ployment in the garden, afi"ords a delightful recreation, and as age compels us to withdraw 

 from the busy cares of life, the attachment to flowers, and the delights of gardening, come 

 to soothe the later periods of our existence. 



In the growth of flowers, from the first tender shoots putting forth from the earth, 

 through all the changes which they undergo, to the period of their utmost beauty, man 

 will do well to behold and contemplate the wonderful process of creative wisdom and 

 power. What can be more interesting than to watch Nature in all her progressive stages, 

 from the planting of the seed to the maturity of the perfect flower.' and who, upon ob- 

 serving the perfect order which prevails throughout her whole varied and extensive terri- 

 tory, and gazing on the delicate texture, admirable structure, and fairj' pencillings of such 

 a flower as the Phaius albus., but will exclaim, that 



Nature is but a name for an eflcct 



Whose cause is God. Not a flower 



But shows some touch, in freckle, streak, or stain, 



Of his unrivall'd pencil. Heinspires 



Their odors, and imparts their hues, 



And bathes their ej-es with nectar, and includes 



In grains as countless as the sea-side sands, 



The forms with which he sprinkles all tlie earth. 



Happy who walks with him! wliom, what he finds 



Oi flavor, or of scent, in fruit or flower, 



Or what ho views of beautiful or grand 



In nature, from the broad majestic oak 



To the green blade that twinkles in the sun, 



Prompts with remembrance of a present God! 



We view the bud as it swells, look into the expanded blossom, and delight in its rich 

 tints and fragrant odors; but more than all, how great the charm in contemplating the 

 precise conformation and mutual adaptation of its organs, and the undeviating regul 

 with which their various metamorphoses are effected; before which, all the combined 



