It ran:
"Through the softly-parted portieres which separate Mrs. J. Barton
Brooks's back-parlour from the dining room came a gracious emanation
of scent and colour. I stopped for a moment in the doorway, and saw,
abloom there before me, a magical maze of flowers. Flowers! Oh,
multifold fragrance and tints divine which so ineffably enrich our
lives! Does anyone know whence they come? Those fragile fairy
creatures whose housetop is the sky; wakened by golden dawn; for
whom the silver moon sings lullaby. Yes; sunlight it is, and blue
sky and green earth, that endow them with their mysterious beauty;
these, and the haze of rain that filters down when clouds rear their
sullen heads. Sun and sky, and earth and rain; they alone may know--
know the secrets of these fairy-folk who, from their slyly-opened
petals, watch us at our hurrying business of life. . . We, mere
humans, can never know. With us it must suffice to sweeten our
hearts with the memory of fragrant flowers."
She was proud of that opening paragraph. But Ed Martin blue-
pencilled it.
"Short of space this week," he said.
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