98 CHILDEEN AND EtOWEES, 
We tread on flowers, flowers meet our every glance, 
It is the scene, the season of romance. 
The very hridal of the earth and sky.” 
JOSIAH CONDOE. 
Mrs, Hemans, in one of her letters to a friend, 
says: I really think that fine passion for 
flowers is the only one which long sickness 
leaves untouched with its chilling influence. 
Often during this weary illness of mine, have I 
looked upon new books with perfect apathy, 
when if a friend has sent me a few flowers, my 
heart has leaped up to their dreamy hues and 
odours, with a sudden sense of renovated child¬ 
hood, which seems to me one of the mysteries 
of our being.” How many instances might be 
quoted to show the prevalence of this mysterious 
feeling. How often, when the frame has become 
worn out by disease, and while the sufferer was 
calmly awaiting the approach of death;—when 
all the joys, sorrows, hopes, and fears of mor¬ 
tality have faded away, even as a dream, from 
the memory,_the scenes and circumstances of 
childhood,—forgotten amid the turmoil of stormy 
passions and painful anxieties,—have arisen 
