Flowers and Gardens 



surely have an eventful history? And 

 with curiosity rather stimulated than satis- 

 fied by the scanty knowledge you could 

 glean, you fell back upon the imagination, 

 which set it down as an actor in some 

 strange and awful tale, as that of a young 

 man who gathered some unknown wild 

 flowers that attracted him, and who, to- 

 gether with his betrothed, was poisoned 

 by their touch. Feelings of this sort 

 were strongly awakened in my mind in 

 childhood by such plants as Caper Spurge, 

 Henbane, Rue, and other more beautiful 

 species, as the Dog's-Tooth Violet, with its 

 spotted leaves, the common Nigella, and 

 the pink Marsh-Mallow of the fields. 



Want of general effect ! Is there none 

 in those cottage gardens, where the Nas- 

 turtiums twine lovingly all the summer 

 amongst Jasmine, Clematis, and thickly 

 trellised Rose — where the towering splen- 

 dour of the Hollyhocks is confronted by 

 the broad discs of the Sunflower, and 

 where the huge leaves, herbs, and fruit- 

 trees of the kitchen garden run close up 

 on or intermix with the border flowers, 

 amongst which we may meet at any time 

 with some new or long - absent friend ? 

 Here are no masses of colour in the 

 modern sense ; but do you ever feel the 



