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222
A New England Girlhood, Outlined from Memory (Beverly, MA)
·
Lucy Larcom
177
Flowers
had
begun
to
bring
me
messages
from
their
own
world
when
I
was
a
very
small
child,
and
they
never
withdrew
their
companionship
from
my
thoughts,
for
there
came
summers
when
I
could
only
look
out
of
the
mill
window
and
dream
about
them.
I
had
one
pet
window
plant
of
my
own,
a
red
rosebush,
almost
a
perpetual
bloomer,
that
I
kept
beside
me
at
my
work
for
years.
I
parted
with
it
only
when
I
went
away
to
the
West,
and
then
with
regret,
for
it
had
been
to
me
like
a
human
little
friend.
But
the
wild
flowers
had
my
heart.
I
lived
and
breathed
with
them,
out
under
the
free
winds
of
heaven;
and
when
I
could
not
see
them,
I
wrote
about
them.
Much
that
I
contributed
to
those
mill-magazine
pages,
they
suggested,--my
mute
teachers,
comforters,
and
inspirers.
It
seems
to
me
that
any
one
who
does
not
care
for
wild
flowers
misses
half
the
sweetness
of
this
mortal
life.
Horace
Smith's
"Hymn
to
the
Flowers"
was
a
continual
delight
to
me,
after
I
made
its
acquaintance.
It
seemed
as
if
all
the
wild
blossoms
of
the
woods
had
wandered
in
and
were
twining
themselves
around
the
whirring
spindles,
as
I
repeated
it,
verse
after
verse.
Better
still,
they
drew
me
out,
in
fancy,
to
their
own
forest-haunts
under
"cloistered
boughs,"
where
each
swinging
"floral
bell"
was
ringing
"a
call
to
prayer,"
and
making
"Sabbath
in
the
fields."
Bryant's
"Forest
Hymn"
did
me
an
equally
beautiful
service.
I
knew
every
word
of
it.
It
seemed
to
me
that
Bryant
understood
the
very
heart
and
soul
of
the
flowers
as
hardly
anybody
else
did.
He
made
me
feel
as
if
they
were
really
related
to
us
human
beings.
In
fancy
my
feet
pressed
the
turf
where
they
grew,
and
I
knew
them
as
my
little
sisters,
while
my
thoughts
touched
them,
one
by
one,
saying
with
him,--
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