PLEASANT DAYS OF MY CIJILDHOOD. 41 



moss and decorated with dry striped snail-shells and 

 bright stones. 



Our garden tools werd of the rudest — our trowel a 

 rusty iron ladle, our spade a broken-bladed carving- 

 knife, and we daily watered the flowers from a battered 

 tin tea-pot and a leaky japanned mug. But in spite of 

 'these unhandy implements, the garden throve and 

 blossomed in the wilderness. 



There, sheltered from sun and shower among the 

 bowery honeysuckles, we reclined on the green turf, 

 happy as children could be, and listened to the oft- 

 repeated stories and old ballads that were recited by our 

 two elder sisters. How we delighted in those tales and 

 quaint old rhymes, and how little we dreamed that the 

 time would come when the sisters who regaled us with 

 them would make a name for themselves in the world of 

 letters.* 



Many years afterwards I visited the " little lane." A 

 few crocuses and snowdrops, choked by long grass and 

 weeds, were, all that were left to mark the spot where 

 " once a garden smiled." 



I stooped and as of old drank of the bright little 

 stream, and gathered a nosegay of the sweet violets to 

 Carry away as a souvenir of my childhood. Often in 

 after years have the memories of those May days among 

 the cowslips and daisied meads of the Waveney come 

 back to my wearied soul to cheer and soothe the exile 

 in her far distant forest home. 



* Elizabeth and Agnes Strickland. 



