A JUNE IDYL 133 
petals white as moonlight of calm summer nights 
and their golden centers yellow as the gold of 
beech trees at their autumn splendor! “Enough, 
I have seen enough,” any right mind would say. 
For myself I could not think out a loveliness 
more perfect than a June prairie dipping to a 
lily pond and sown to water-lily flowers. 
But God thinks things out which beggar our 
expectations. It was so this June day on this 
prairie. For among the swamp grasses which 
girt in their blessed hold the water-lily lake, were 
sown in proud, yet not arrogant, profusion a 
bewilderment of wild fleur-de-lis. Not a few, 
though a few of this chaste blue beauty will make 
a heart dream and sing out like a linnet’s song, 
but a profusion of them such as would shame 
the counting. A touch of vision would warn you 
against the arithmetical folly of attempting the 
enumeration of this field of fleur-de-lis. 
I had seen this chaste loveliness many a time, 
though never enough times. You can never see 
beauty frequently enough. But I had seen a 
solitary flower with its enticing shape and poise 
and color beside a stream; and that one flower 
created all the spring. And beside a great lake, 
within hearing of its wrangling waters, I had 
seen a swamp encroached on by the drifting 
sands, crowded with fleur-de-lis, so that the whole 
landscape fairly laughed out loud at its own 
abundance of beauty. But never had I seen such 
sedate multitudes of quiet, blue enchantments as 
