And I now recall the impressions of springtime, all the fresh splendor
of May; and I remember vividly the lonely road called the Fountain road.
(As I am endeavoring to put my recollections into some sort of order I
think that at this time I must have been about five years old.)
I was old enough at any rate to take walks with my father and my sister,
and I went out with them this dewy morning. I was in ecstasy to see
that everything had become so green, to see the budding foliage and the
tasselled shrubs and hedges. Along the sides of the road the grass was
all the same length, and the flowers in the grass with their exquisite
mingling of the red of the geranium and the blue of the speedwell,
made the whole earth seem a great bouquet. As I plucked the flowers I
scarcely knew which way to run; in my eagerness I trod upon them and
my legs became wet from the dew--I marvelled at all the richness at my
disposal, and I longed to take great armfuls of the flowers and carry
them away with me.
My sister, who had gathered a sprig of hawthorn, one of iris and some
long sheath-like grasses leaned towards me, and took my hand, and said:
“You have enough for the present; you see, dear, that we could never
gather all of them.”
But I did not heed, so absolutely intoxicated was I with the
magnificence about me, the like of which I did not recall ever to have
seen before.
That was the beginning of those almost daily excursions that I took with
my father and sister, and that I kept up for so long a time (almost
to my boarding-school days). It is through them that I became so well
acquainted with the surrounding country and with the varieties of
flowers found there. Poor fields and meadows of my native country! So
monotonous, so flat, one so like another; fields of hay and daisies
where in childhood I would disappear from sight and hide under the green
vegetation. Fields of corn and paths bordered with hawthorn, I love you
all in spite of your monotony!
Toward the west, in the far distance, my eyes sought for a glimpse of
the sea. Sometimes when we had gone a long way there would appear upon
the horizon, among the other lines there, a straight bluish one; it
was the sea; and it lured me to it finally as a great and patient lover
lures, who sure of his power is willing to wait.
My sister and my brother, of whom I have not spoken before, were
considerably older than I; it seemed almost as if we belonged to
different generations. For that reason they petted me even more than did
my father and mother, my grandmother and aunts; and as I was the only
child among them I was cherished like a little hot-house plant, I was
too tenderly guarded and remained all too unacquainted with thorns and
brambles.