68 A WHITE-PAPER GARDEN 



aweary are eager now to follow and to find. 

 After him, over the vernal meadows, and 

 through the thickening woods, troop the goodly 

 fellowship of the poets who have been his joyous 

 slaves, and one with the perennial freshness 

 of the songs of his birds are the haunting 

 words into which they have tried to put his 

 charm. That they could not do so was no 

 fault of theirs. The glory and the beauty of 

 April are for the spirit and cannot be made 

 flesh. 



All of the virtues praised by the Apostles 

 may be found in an April garden, but it is 

 chiefly as a Land of Promise that it looks to 

 us, as the first days come and go. Daffodils 

 are abloom by the hundred, and in many 

 varying shades of sun-colour. There is more 

 sentiment connected with the old-fashioned 

 yellow one, but there are so many lovely 

 narcissi, that the day of this charming flower 

 may be greatly prolonged by planting in many 

 sorts together. I, myself, in happier days, had 

 a bed of them which bloomed for six weeks, 

 and even that time might have been prolonged 

 if I had had some of the bulbs of a dear old 

 double white variety that used to grow in old 



