Then just within the gate I saw a child — 



A strange child, yet to my heart most dear — 



He held his hands to me, and softly smiled 



With eyes that knew no shade of sin or fear; 



" Come in," he said, " and play awhile with me ; 



I am the little child you used to be;" 



Henry van Dyke. 



A Girl's Garden 



I see the garden thicket's shade 

 Where all the summer long we played ; 

 And gardens set and houses niade. 



Our early work and late. 



Mary Howitt. 



Let us peer into these garden thickets at these 

 happy little girls, fantastic in their garden dress. 

 Their hair is hung thick with Dandelion curls, made 

 from pale green opal-tinted stems that have grown 

 long under the shrubbery and Box borders. Around 

 their necks are childish wampum, strings of Dande- 

 lion beads or Daisy chains. More delicate wreaths 

 for the neck or hair were made from the blossoms 

 of the Four-o'clock or the petals of Phlox or Lilacs, 

 threaded with pretty alternation of color. Fuchsias 

 were hung at the ears for eardrops, green leaves were 

 pinned with leaf stems into little caps and bonnets 

 and aprons. Foxgloves made dainty children's gloves. 

 Truly the garden-bred child went in gay attire. 



Alice Morse Earle. 



A Boy's Garden 



Like other boys in the country, I had my patch 

 of ground, to which, in the springtime, I entrusted 

 the seeds furnished me, with a confident trust in 

 their resurrection and glorification in the better world 

 of summer. 



