











142 I FEEL YOUR KINDNESS. 
Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
To me the pledge of hope unseen: 
When sorrow would my soul o’erpower 
For joys that were, or might have been, 
Ill call to mind, how—fresh and green,— 
I saw thee waking from the dust, 
Then turn to heaven with brow serene, 
And place in God my trust. 
wenn 
I FEEL YOUR KINDNESS. 
FLAX. 
Then on the rock a scanty measure place 
Of vital flax, and turned the wheel apace, 
And turning sung. DRYDEN’S OVID. 
TruLy we ought to be grateful to this useful 
plant! It yields us the linen we wear, the 
paper we write upon, and the lace which adorns 
our fair countrywomen. Nowhere can we 
cast our eyes but we see evidence of its 
utility. It has been cultivated from time im- 
memorial for the lint and tow it affords, and 
it was formerly the chief occupation of our cot- 
tagers’ wives to spin this into yarn and linen 
cloth. It is grown pretty generally in the Isle 
of Axholme, in Lincolnshire. Our Devonian 
bard, Carrington, mentions it in “ Dartmoor,’’ 
where its cultivation has been attempted by 
Sir Thomas Tyrwhitt and others with partial 
success :— 
