HERBS O' GRACE 145 



Bit by bit it fell upon the ears while standing tiptoe 

 before a white-doored cupboard. The shelves were filled 

 with precious jars and vials, each bearing its own inscrip- 

 tion in slant Italian lettering. The wisdom gained when 

 hunting among the garret rafters lingers a lifetime. There 

 bunches of drying odorous leaves hung among the wasps' 

 nests; or, best of all, is the lore won through many long 

 days tramping the woods for roots and herbs, haunting 

 the marshes and streams, and in those hours when climb- 

 ing lonely paths to rocky heights for plants that shun 

 human association. 



To the true believer faith is firm in the jars of golden 

 liquid standing neatly side by side on the shelves. The 

 child looks upon them with awe ; but as one passes out of 

 the old-homestead atmosphere and grows to years of dis- 

 cretion, he may cherish a doubt if the lily leaves plucked 

 from the garden in the "up of the moon" when the dew 

 is jeweling their whiteness, and bottled away in fine old 

 rye, possess the power accorded them of the medicinal 

 nature of herbs. 



Is not this one of the primrose ways tempting the 

 gentry, who look with horror on the wine that is red, to 

 take an occasional draught "for the stomach's sake'"? 

 The devotee of old-wives' wisdom and the learning of 

 herb gatherers would cry heresy at the thought, for what 

 other rite of the garden is like to that of gathering lily 

 leaves in the radiance of a waxing moon, and storing 



