

CHAPTER XVIL 



OLD FASHIONED FLOWEKS. 



"O, Father, Lord! 



The All-beneficent ! I bless thy name, 

 That thou hast mantled the green earth with flowers, 

 Linking our hearts to nature ! The old man's eye 

 Falls on the kindling blossoms, and his soul 

 Remembers youth and love, and hopefully 

 Turns unto Thee, who call'st earth's buried germs 

 From dust to splendor; as the mortal seed 

 Shall, at thy summons, from the grave spring up, 

 To put on glory, to be girt with power, 

 And flll'd with immortality." 



" Common in old country gardens," is the term we often hear applied 

 to flowers that are a little old-fashioned ; yet to many hearts they are 

 very dear. Not all the boasted glories of Verbenas, Coleus, Achyranthus, 

 and all the newer kinds of bedding-out plants can wean us from the 

 flowers our grandmothers loved to cherish. Their colors, markings and 

 veinings may be far surpassed by the flowers of the present day, yet 

 loved hands once tended them ; bright eyes grew brighter at the sight 

 of them ; and they are associated with all that is holy, pure, and of good 

 report. Who does not like to remember the days of childhood, when 

 the gathering of old-fashioned flowers in grandmother's garden was one 

 of the highest pleasures of life ? Cowper says, that "it is a pity that a 

 kitten should ever become a staid, old cat," and there certainly are indi- 

 viduals who are tempted to wish that they had ever continued to be 

 children. Do you remember the delicious fragrance of the white Lilac 

 bushes that grew beside the door step, at the old farm house, and the 

 handsful of Lilies of the Valley, that you used to gather under the old 



