THE STORY OF A BLADE OF GRASS. 
3 
a delicious verdure, the grim realities of Nature, and 
clothes the sordid facts of earth and iron with a garment 
of life and beauty. From the constant freshness, fragrance, 
and fruitfulness of grass, it has been held in tender regard 
in all ages of the world, and has mingled alike with the 
outpourings of the human heart, under the inspirations 
of poetry, with the voices and harmonies of Nature in 
her teachings of love, with the struggles of nations for 
power or freedom, and with the grim scenes wherein the 
human heart has paid the tribute of its blood to super¬ 
stition, oppression, and despotism. It would seem 
meet, therefore, that something should be said about 
Grass, in order that those who tread on it unheedingly, 
may know something of its history; and that those who 
have listened to the teachings of the out-door world, and 
welcomed its verdure into their sanctuary of love, may 
have its memories and images awakened within them, 
and so learn to love it more. 
“ Then to the enamell’d meads 
Thou go’st; and as thy foot there treads,. 
Thou seest a present God like power 
Imprinted in each herb and flower.” 
Herrick.. 
To mention the greenness of the grass is to awaken at 
the same time a thousand remembrances of green things 
generally, for the mind calls them up in numberless 
pictures, that the heart may feast upon their beauty. 
“ Green things,” and we think of Virgil and his brown 
bees; Longus and his happy children; Keats and his 
green trees, “ sprouting a shady boon for simple sheep •” 
Chaucer and his imperishable daisies, which he rose early 
v 2 
