Childhood in a Garden 
3 2 9 
have grown up knowing not when “ the summer 
comes with bee and flower.” 
A garden childhood gives more sources of delight 
to the senses in after life than come from beautiful 
color and fine fragrance. Have you pleasure in the 
contact of a flower? Do you like its touch as well 
as its perfume ? Do you love to feel a Lilac spray 
brush your cheek in the cool of the evening? Do 
you like to bury your face in a bunch of Roses ? 
H ow frail and papery is the Larkspur! And how 
silky is the Poppy ! A Locust bloom is a fringe of 
sweetness ; and how very doubtful is the touch of the 
Lily — an unpleasant thick sleekness. The Clove 
Carnation is the best of all. It feels just as it 
smells. These and scores more give me pleasure 
through their touch, the result of constant handling 
of flowers when I was a child. 
There were harmful flowers in the old garden — 
among them the Monk’s-hood; we never touched 
it, except warily. Doubtless we were warned, but 
we knew it by instinct and did not need to be told. 
I always used to see in modest homes great tubs 
each with a flourishing Oleander tree. I have set 
out scores of little slips of Oleander, just as I planted 
Orange seeds. I seldom see Oleanders now ; I 
wonder whether the plant has been banished on 
account of its poisonous properties. I heard of but 
one fatal case of Oleander poisoning — and that was 
doubtful. A little child, the sister of one of my 
playmates, died suddenly in great distress. Several 
months after her death the mother was told that the 
leaves of the Oleander were poisonous, when she 
