226 
Old Time Gardens 
The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table says: “Did 
you ever hear a poet who did not talk flowers ? 
Don’t you think a poem which for the sake of 
being original should leave them out, would be like 
those verses where the letter a or e, or some other, 
is omitted ? No ; they will bloom over and over 
again in poems as in the summer fields, to the end 
of time, always old and always new.” The Auto- 
crat himself knew well a poet who never talked 
flowers in his poems, a poet beloved of all other 
poets, — Arthur Hugh Clough, — though he loved 
and knew all flowers. From Matthew Arnold’s 
beautiful tribute to him, are a few of his wonderful 
flower lines, cut out from their fellows : — 
“ Through the thick Corn the scarlet Poppies peep. 
And round green roots and yellowing stalks I see 
Pale blue Convolvulus in tendrils creep. 
And air-swept Lindens yield 
Their scent, and rustle down their perfumed showers 
Of bloom. . . , 
Vp v!> <S ‘J> vj> 
“Soon will the high midsummer pomps come on, 
Soon will the Musk Carnations break and swell. 
Soon shall we have gold-dusted Snapdragon, 
Sweet-william with his homely cottage smell. 
And Stocks in fragrant blow.” 
Oh, what a master hand ! Where in all English 
verse are fairer flower hues ? And where is a more 
beautiful description of a midsummer evening, than 
Arnold’s exquisite lines beginning : — 
“ The evening comes ; the fields are still ; 
The tinkle of the thirsty rill.” 
