20 MORE POT-POURRI 



feel that children, like older people and plants and any 

 living thing, are subject to the eternal and terrible order 

 of change ; have phases during which their whole nature 

 may become either lethargic and indifferent, or on the 

 other hand be dominated by sexual feeling, receptive or 

 otherwise. One girl at the budding period feels and sees 

 nothing harmful to her mind and morals ; while another, 

 hitherto pure and simple-minded, may have her imagina- 

 tion stimulated and her morbid curiosity partially grati- 

 fied by access to all and any kind of reading, and this 

 may have the effect of soiling a mind in the first and 

 most delicate stage of development. Children, too, are 

 extraordinarily unexpected in their phases, and often 

 turn out so much better or worse than one thought with- 

 out any apparent reason.' As regards the reading, in 

 spite of all that has been said, I cannot alter my view 

 that on the whole it is better to leave a great deal of 

 liberty from childhood upwards, allowing the child to 

 form her own taste, it being better to manage the reading 

 of the young by advice than by restrictions. 



September 3rd. A few days ago I returned home after 

 being abroad and away from my garden for over three 

 months. I left towards the end of May, when all was 

 fresh and green, bursting with bud and life, and full of 

 the promise of the coming summer. In three months 

 all seemed over ; the little place looked dried up and 

 miserable, small, ugly, disappointing in fact, hardly 

 worth possessing at all. 



I felt dreadfully depressed, but of course all this was 

 in great measure due to the time of year, the end of 

 August being the very worst month for this garden, and 

 one that I have never attempted to struggle with, yielding 

 rather to the difficulties and generally going away. Shall 

 I also confess my own character had something to do 

 with it ? Many people say, ' Absence makes the heart 



