AIY FARM OF EDGEWOOD 



one may arrange his parterres and his gradu- 

 ated banks of flowers, quite secundum artem. 

 And I suppose, that, when completed, these 

 orderly arrays of the latest and newest floral 

 wonders are enjoyable. Yet I am no fair 

 judge; the appreciation of them demands a 

 "booking-up" in floral science to which I can 

 lay no claim. I sometimes wander through 

 the elegant gardens of my town friends, fairly 

 dazzled by all the splendor and the orderly 

 ranks of beauties; but nine times in ten— if I 

 do not guard my tongue with a prudent reti- 

 cence, and allow my admiration to ooze out 

 only in exclamations— I mortify the gardener 

 by admiring some timid flower, which nestles 

 under cover of the flaunting Dahlias or Peonies, 

 and which proves to be only some dainty 

 weed, or an antiquated plant, which the florists 

 no longer catalogue. Everybody knows how 

 ridiculous it is to admire a picture by an un- 

 known artist; and I must confess to feeling 

 the fear of a kindred ridicule, whenever I stroll 

 through the gardens of an accomplished ama- 

 teur. 



But I console myself with thinking that I 

 have company in my mal-adroitness, and that 

 there is a great crowd of people in the world, 

 who admire spontaneously what seems to be 



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