SPRING IN THE CITY 



in the shape of pedlers' flower-carts. These last 

 seem like visions of a brighter world let into the 

 dismal monotony of our dreary side-streets. 



Strangely enough, few of these flowers which Foreign 

 are peddled about the streets or sold in the shops, •^ ows 

 are natives. And as one studies the gayly filled 

 window, or half unconsciously notes the contents 

 of the pedler's cart, if he chance to be something 

 of a traveller as well as a flower-lover, memories 

 of many lands flash through his mind. 



The yellow jonquils now so abundant recall 

 the rocky shores of southern Italy, for during that 

 wonderful drive from Castellamare to Sorrento, 

 early in December (though properly and botani- 

 cally these flowers belong to May), I first saw 

 them at home. It has never been my good fort- 

 une to find in its native haunts that near cousin jonquils 

 of the jonquil, the daffodil. But how abundant 

 this is during the early spring in England no 

 lover of Wordsworth need be told. And until he 

 beholds it with other than the " inward eye/' 

 he has in possible anticipation an enchanting ex- 

 perience. 



With the crocus is associated my earliest Crocus 

 glimpse of Switzerland. It was already late in 

 August when, for the first time, I looked upon 

 the Alps. And almost as great as my awe-struck 

 exultation in the grandeur of the snow-capped 



33 



