46 
THE BOUQUET. 
wants to give them something useful—a bushel of potatoes or a 
ham, for example.” 
“ Why, certainly, potatoes and ham must he had; but, having 
ministered to the first and most craving wants, why not add any 
little pleasure or gratifications that we may have it in our power to 
give. I know that there are many of the poor who have fine feeling 
and a keen sense of the beautiful, which rusts out and dies because 
they are too hard pressed to procure it one gratification. Poor Mrs. 
Stephens, for example; I know she would enjoy birds, and flowers, 
and music as much as I do. I have seen her eye kindle as she has 
looked on the things in our drawing-room, and yet not one beautiful 
thing can she command. From necessity, her room, her clothing, 
all that she has, must be coarse and plain. You should have seen 
the almost rapture that she and Mary felt when I offered them my 
Rose.” 
“ Dear me ! all this may be true, but I never thought of it before. 
I never thought that these hard-working people had any idea of 
taste ! ” 
“ Then why do you see so often the Geranium or Rose carefully 
nursed in an old cracked tea-pot in the poorest room, or the Morn¬ 
ing Glories planted in a box, and made to twine around the window. 
Do not all these show how every human heart yearns after the 
beautiful ? You remember how Mary our washerwoman sat up a 
whole night after a hard day’s work, that she might make her first 
baby a pretty little dress to be baptized in.” 
“ Yes, I remember, and how I laughed at you for making such a 
tasty little cap for it.” 
“ Well, Katy, I think that the look of perfect delight and satis¬ 
faction with which the poor girl regarded her baby in its new dress 
and cap, was something quite worth creating; 1 do believe she 
could not have thanked me more, if I had sent her a barrel of 
flour.” 
*■ Well, I never before thought of giving to the poor anything but 
