stroll round a little.

It was such a sweet evening, such a fitting close to a beautiful May
Day, and the flowers shone in the twilight like pale stars, and the air
was full of fragrance, and I envied the bats fluttering through such a
bath of scent, with the real stars above and the pansy stars beneath,
and themselves so fashioned that even if they wanted to they could not
make a noise and disturb the prevailing peace. A great deal that is
poetical has been written by English people about May Day, and the
impression left on the foreign mind is an impression of posies, and
garlands, and village greens, and youths and maidens much be-ribboned,
and lambs, and general friskiness. I was in England once on a May Day,
and we sat over the fire shivering and listening blankly to the north-
east wind tearing down the street and the rattling of the hail against
the windows, and the friends with whom I was staying said it was very
often so, and that they had never seen any lambs and ribbons. We Germans
attach no poetical significance to it at all, and yet we well might, for
it is almost invariably beautiful; and as for garlands, I wonder how
many villages full of young people could have been provided with them
out of my garden, and nothing be missed. It is to-day a garden of
wallflowers, and I think I have every colour and sort in cultivation.
The borders under the south windows of the house, so empty and
melancholy this time last year, are crammed with them, and are finished
off in front by a broad strip from end to end of yellow and white
pansies. The tea rose beds round the sun-dial facing these borders are
sheets of white, and golden, and purple, and wine-red pansies, with the
dainty red shoots of the tea roses presiding delicately in their midst.
The verandah steps leading down into this pansy paradise have boxes of
white, and pink, and yellow tulips all the way up on each side, and on
the lawn, behind the roses, are two big beds of every coloured tulip