Now, thanks to the busy little fingers that
passed over these leaves, I have a fund of amusement laid up for me;
for every page has its story, and each mutilated flower is the centre
of a beautiful picture. Here the ludicrous and the pathetic are so
exquisitely blended, that I laugh with a regretful feeling at my
heart, and sigh even when smiles are on my face. The first few pages
are light and joyous, full of a child's warm impulses and ready zeal,
and enlivened here and there by some roguish caprice. That was the
time when, in my simplicity, I loved dandelions and buttercups, and
could see beauty even in the common white-weed of the fields. Ah!
here they are, arranged in whimsical positions,--Clover and Sorrel,
Violets and Blue-eyed Grass, Peppergrass and Dock (O, how hard
that was to press!), Mouse-Ear and Yarrow, Shepherd's Purse,
Buttercups, and full-blown Dandelion, Succory, and Chickweed, and
Gill-run-over-the-ground,--with their homeliest names written in
sprawling characters, all down hill, beneath them. I did not aspire to
botanical names in those days. I thought nothing was unfit for my new
Herbarium. Such was my zeal, that I believe I should have filled it
entirely in a few days, if I had not been counselled to make a
judicious selection.
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