"
"Alas, my Father!" cried the boy, "the borders are set with rue, and
there are but a few clumps of hearts-ease here and there."
"Could I forget what I saw in an hour?" asked the old man angrily.
"And did not the holy Raphael himself point to them, saying, 'Blessed
are the eyes that behold this garden, where the borders are set with
hearts-ease, and the hedges crowned with palm!' But thou wouldst know
better than an archangel, forsooth."
Then the boy wept; and when the hermit heard him weeping, he put his
arm round him and said,
"Weep, not, my dear Son. And I pray thee, pardon me that I spoke
harshly to thee. For indeed I am ill-tempered by reason of my
infirmities; and as for thee, GOD will reward thee for thy goodness to
me, as I never can. Moreover, I believe it is thy modesty, which is as
great as thy goodness, that hath hindered thee from telling me of all
that thou hast done for my garden, even to those fair and sweet
everlasting flowers, the like of which I never saw before, which thou
hast set in the east border, and where even now I hear the bees
humming in the sun."
Then the boy looked sadly out into the garden, and answered, "I cannot
lie to thee. There are no everlasting flowers. It is the flowers of
the thyme in which the bees are rioting. And in the hedge bottom there
creepeth the bitter-sweet.
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