Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE JOY OF A GARDEN. " A wilderness of flowers around us lying, Tangling our steps the hidden pathway throng; Myrtles and vines bloom there above thee, sighing, As the wind wakes their fibres into song. Life here is Eros, that hath ever been, The sigh of Death forgot, the shadow Time unseen." John E. Eeade. 0 Blinding sunshine and green coolness! 0 fresh morning air and dew-powdered gossamers ! O wakeful colours and sleepy odours! O shivering leaves and rustling bird's-wing! O joyful dawn, with hum of voices! and O sultry noon, with dead stillness, silent, and oppressive! O mossy turf! O sparkling fountain ! O dark mould, that, out of thy dead heart, sendest up the joy of summer in flowers that nse like souls released from the sepulchre ! 0 emerald spring, crouching in shyness ! O lusty summer, confronting the sun in thy bold strength and ardour ! O fiery autumn, gathering the glories of all seasons to thyself, to swell the grandeur of thy flaming sacrifice' and O hoary winter, magician and destroyer, by whose touch the world is hushed to rest, and the grave of beauty garnished with a robe of whiteness 1 Where, but in a garden, shall we see and hear, and press to our heart of hearts the precious wealth of a whole creation ? "Where, but in a garden, shall we meet with genuine heart-ease ? Where, but in a garden, learn the sweet idleness that seems like a dream of Eden ? Where, but in a garden, acquire the quick action and the anxious thought that prove us to be fallen creatures ? Where, but in a garden, realize our dependence upon God, and understand the links that bind us to Him ? Where else see the lilies "how they grow," and the sparrows that fall not but at His bidding ? Where, but iu a garden, feel the full remembrance that man fell from God in the very mornin...