COMMUTER'S WIFE 29 



catalogues, simple, convincing affairs lacking the 

 gaudy colour horrors from which, happily, we seem 

 to be again emerging. 



When the lists had been duly made and recon- 

 sidered, for the seed-lists of enthusiasts always 

 have to be cut down and reconstructed, they were 

 mailed. The second rapture was when the parcels 

 came. Oh, the delicious smell of the manila paper 

 bags that held the bulbs, and the damp, bog moss 

 that wrapped growing roots, in which I remember 

 once finding a cranberry plant with a berry, and 

 thus learning that the red fruit did not grow upon 

 a tree like cherries, as I had thought! These two 

 odours are among my primary memories, not to be 

 forgotten any more than I could forget mother's 

 way of lingering over my name as she pronounced 

 it, the sky light in her eyes, of the purple blue of 

 the fringed gentian, or the expression of father's 

 face when on coming home from a long morning 

 ride he found mother among her flowers ; she 

 would bring him a welcome bit of luncheon and 

 some cooling drink as he rested under the old 

 apple tree while she listened to his report of vari- 

 ous happenings, and I absorbed scraps of food 

 and conversation alike. 



I never again saw that look in his eyes after 



