A FIRE in winter, a flower in summer! If you can have a fine printor picture all the year round, so much the better; you will thusalways have a bit of sunshine in your room, whether the sky be clearor not. But, above all, a flower in summer!
Most people have yet to learn the true enjoyment of life; it is notfine dresses, or large houses, or elegant furniture, or rich wines,or gay parties, that make homes happy. Really, wealth cannotpurchase pleasures of the higher sort; these depend not on money, ormoney's worth; it is the heart, and taste, and intellect, whichdetermine the happiness of men; which give the seeing eye and thesentient nature, and without which, man is little better than a kindof walking clothes-horse.
A snug and a clean home, no matter how tiny it be, so that it bewholesome; windows, into which the sun can shine cheerily; a fewgood books (and who need be without a few good books in these daysof universal cheapness?)--no duns at the door, and the cupboard wellsupplied, and with a flower in your room!--and there is none so pooras not to have about him the elements of pleasure.
Hark! there is a child passing our window calling "wallflowers!" Wemust have a bunch forthwith: it is only a penny! A shower has justfallen, the pearly drops are still hanging upon the petals, and theysparkle in the sun which has again come out in his beauty.
How deliciously the flower smells of country and nature! It is likesummer coming into our room to greet us. The wallflowers are fromKent, and only last night were looking up to the stars from theirnative stems; they are full of buds yet, with their promise of freshbeauty. "Betty! bring a glass of clear water to put these flowersin!" and so we set to, arranging and displaying our pennyworth tothe best advantage.
But what do you say to a nosegay of roses? Here you have a specimenof the most beautiful of the smiles of Nature! Who, that looks onone of these bright full-blown beauties, will say that she is sad,or sour, or puritanical! Nature tells us to be happy, to be glad,for she decks herself with roses, and the fields, the skies, thehedgerows, the thickets, the green lanes, the dells, the mountains,the morning and evening sky, are robed in loveliness. The "laughingflowers," exclaims the poet! but there is more than gayety in theblooming flower, though it takes a wise man to see its fullsignificance--there is the beauty, the love, and the adaptation, ofwhich it is full. Few of us, however, see any more deeply in thisrespect than did Peter Bell:--
"A primrose by a river's brim, A yellow primrose was to him, And it was nothing more."
What would we think or say of one who had inventedflowers-supposing, that before him, flowers were things unknown;would it not be the paradise of a new delight? should we not hailthe inventor as a genius as a god? And yet these lovely offspringsof the earth have been speaking to man from the first dawn of hisexistence till now, telling him of the goodness and wisdom of theCreating Power, which bade the earth bring forth, not only thatwhich was useful as food, but also flowers, the bright consummateflowers, to clothe it in beauty and joy!
See that graceful fuchsia, its blood-red petals, and calyx ofbluish-purple, more exquisite in colour and form than any hand oreyes, no matter how well skilled and trained, can imitate! We canmanufacture no colours to equal those of our flowers in their brightbrilliancy--such, for instance, as the Scarlet Lychnis, theBrowallia, or even the Common Poppy. Then see the exquisite blue ofthe humble Speedwell, and the dazzling white of the Star ofBethlehem, that shines even in the dark. Bring one of even ourcommon field-flowers into a room, place it on your table or chimneypiece, and you seem to have brought a ray of sunshine into theplace. There is ever cheerfulness about flowers; what a delight arethey to the drooping invalid! the very sight of them is cheering;they are like a sweet draught of fresh bliss, coming as messengersfrom the country without, and seeming to say:--"Come and see theplace where we grow, and let thy heart be glad in our presence."
What can be more innocent than flowers! Are they not like childrenundimmed by sin? They are emblems of purity and truth, always a newsource of delight to the pure and the innocent. The heart that doesnot love flowers, or the voice of a playful child, is one that weshould not like to consort with. It was a beautiful conceit thatinvented a language of flowers, by which lovers were enabled toexpress the feelings that they dared not openly speak. But flowershave a voice to all,--to old and young, to rich and poor, if theywould but listen, and try to interpret their meaning. "To me," saysWordsworth,
The meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."
Have a flower in your room then, by all means! It will cost you onlya penny, if your ambition is moderate; and the gratification it willgive you will be beyond all price. If you can have a flower for yourwindow, so much the better. What can be more delicious than thesun's light streaming through flowers--through the midst of crimsonfuchsias or scarlet geraniums? Then to look out into the lightthrough flowers--is not that poetry? And to break the force of thesunbeams by the tender resistance of green leaves? If you can traina nasturtium round the window, or some sweet-peas, then you have themost beautiful frame you can invent for the picture without, whetherit be the busy crowd, or a distant landscape, or trees with theirlights and shades, or the changes of the passing clouds. Any one maythus look through flowers for the price of an old song. And what apure taste and refinement does it not indicate on the part of thecultivator!
A flower in your window sweetens the air, makes your room lookgraceful, gives the sun's light a new charm, rejoices your eye, andlinks you to nature and beauty. You really cannot be altogetheralone, if you have a sweet flower to look upon, and it is acompanion which will never utter a cross thing to anybody, butalways look beautiful and smiling. Do not despise it because it ischeap, and everybody may have the luxury as well as you. Commonthings are cheap, and common things are invariably the mostvaluable. Could we only have a fresh air or sunshine by purchase,what luxuries these would be; but they are free to all, and we thinknot of their blessings.
There is, indeed, much in nature that we do not yet half enjoy,because we shut our avenues of sensation and of feeling. We aresatisfied with the matter of fact, and look not for the spirit offact, which is above all. If we would open our minds to enjoyment,we should find tranquil pleasures spread about us on every side. Wemight live with the angels that visit us on every sunbeam, and sitwith the fairies who wait on every flower. We want some lovingknowledge to enable us truly to enjoy life, and we require tocultivate a little more than we do the art of making the most of thecommon means and appliances for enjoyment, which lie about us onevery side. There are, we doubt not, many who may read these pages,who can enter into and appreciate the spirit of all that we have nowsaid; and, to those who may still hesitate, we would say--begin andexperiment forthwith; and first of all, when the next flower-girlcomes along your street, at once hail her, and "Have a flower foryour room!"
THE END.
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