and had a joy of it I cannot describe, for old and familiar places were
thus made new and wonderful to me. And when I think of those places,
now, say in winter, I grasp them more vividly and strongly than ever I
did before, for I think not only how they look, but how they taste and
smell, and I even know many of the growing things by the touch of them.
It is certain that our grasp of life is in direct proportion to the
variety and warmth of the ways in which we lay hold of it. No thought no
beauty and no joy.

On these excursions I have often reflected that if I were blind, I
should still find here unexplored joys of life, and should make it a
point to know all the friendly trees and shrubs around about by the
taste or smell or touch of them. I think seriously that this method of
widening the world of the blind, and increasing their narrower joys,
might well be developed, though it would be wise for such as do take it
to borrow first the eyes of a friend to see that no poison ivy, which
certain rascally birds plant along our fences and hedges, is lurking
about.

Save for this precaution I know of nothing that will injure the taster,
though he must be prepared, here and there, for shocks and thrills of
bitterness. A lilac leaf, for example, and to a scarcely lesser degree
the willow and the poplar are, when bitten through, of a penetrating and
intense bitterness; but do no harm, and will daunt no one who is really
adventurous. There is yet to be written a botany, or, better yet, a book
of nature, for the blind.

It is by knowing human beings that we come to understand them, and by
understanding them come to love them, and so it is with the green
people. When I was a boy in the wild north country trees were enemies to