164 With Feet to the Earth 



how many flowers are to be crushed under 

 its feet before it begins to appreciate their 

 beauty? And how many will still hold 

 themselves away from flowers, even as 

 things to walk on ? 



The fact is, thousands know nothing 

 about the country, whether it is a desert 

 place or otherwise, and great mercy is 

 shown to children of the tenements when 

 they are sent there. While it means no 

 more to them, at the outset, than kind- 

 nesses and material comforts that they lack 

 at home, they must soon know it to be 

 friendly, and some of them never leave it 

 for the slums. What a revelation it must 

 be to these ragged, profane little scamps 

 to see the fields in their panoply of sum- 

 mer or in their fruitage of October ! Is 

 their sight, or instinct, true enough in 

 early spring to read the hint of life in the 

 woods, before the leaves are out, in the 

 subtle shine, the reddening, greening, yel- 

 lowing of young branches, even where, in 

 mass or distance, they seem dark? In 

 the poetic lucency of afternoon do they 

 spell romances out of their soft, blackish- 



