Childhood in a Garden 
33 1 
blossoms of the Four-o’clock or the petals of Phlox 
or Lilacs, threaded with pretty alternation of color. 
Fuchsias were hung at the ears for eardrops, green 
leaves were pinned with leaf stems into little caps 
and bonnets and aprons, Foxgloves made dainty 
children’s gloves. Truly the garden-bred child 
went in gay attire. 
That exquisite thing, the seed of Milkweed (shown 
on page 328), furnished abundant playthings. The 
plant was sternly exterminated in our garden, but 
sallies into a neighboring field provided supplies for 
fairy cradles with tiny pillows of silvery silk. 
One of the early impulses of infancy is to put every- 
thing in the mouth ; this impulse makes the creeping 
days of some children a period of constant watch- 
fulness and terror to their apprehensive guardians. 
When the children are older and can walk in the 
garden or edge of the woods, a fresh anxiety arises ; 
for a certain savagery in their make-up makes them 
regard every growing thing, not as an object to look 
at or even to play with, but to eat. It is a relief to 
the mother when the child grows beyond the savage, 
and falls under the dominion of tradition and folk- 
lore, communicated to him by other children by 
that subtle power of enlightenment common to chil- 
dren, which seems more like instinct than instruction. 
The child still eats, but he makes distinctions, and 
seldom touches harmful leaves or seeds or berries. 
He has an astonishing range : roots, twigs, leaves, 
bark, tendrils, fruit, berries, flowers, buds, seeds, 
all alike serve for food. Young shoots of Sweet- 
brier and Blackberry are nibbled as well as the 
