From beds of hyacinths, or from jasmine flowers,
Or when the blue-eyed violet weeps upon

Some sloping bank remote, while the young sun
(Creeping within her sheltering bower of leaves)
Dries up her tears.”

BARRY CORNWALL.

The Violet seems a favourite with this author: he introduces it continually. In his last poem, the Flood of Thessaly, he mentions it several times :

"And violets, whose looks are like the skies."

"Jasmine and musk, daisies and hyacinth,
And violets, a blue profusion, sprang
Haunting the air.”

The Violet is continually applauded for its modesty and timidity:

Mr. Keats delights in describing a little woodland nook, and Violets constantly breathe their sweet perfume in it. (See HAWTHORN.)

"where to pry aloof,

Atween the pillars of the sylvan roof,

Would be to find where violet beds were nestling,
And where the bee with cowslip-bells was wrestling."

"Gay villagers, upon a morn of May,

When they have tired their gentle limbs with play,
And formed a snowy circle on the grass,

And placed in midst of all that lovely lass

Who chosen is their queen ;—with her fine head
Crowned with flowers, purple, white, and red;
For there the lily and the musk-rose sighing,
Are emblems true of hapless lovers dying:
Between her breasts, that never yet felt trouble,
A bunch of violets, full-blown, and double,
Serenely sleep."

Ebn Abrumi, an Arabian poet, compares blue eyes weeping, to Violets bathed in dew *.

How beautiful is the following passage in the Winter's Tale!

" violets, dim,

But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,

Or Cytherea's breath."

"In Cymbeline, Belisarius, speaking of the two young princes, says,

cr They are as gentle

As zephyrs, blowing below the violet,
Not wagging his sweet head:"

In Twelfth Night again, the poet has some exquisite lines upon this flower, where the duke, listening to plaintive music, desires

"That strain again; it had a dying fall:

O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,

Stealing, and giving odour."

We are told, in the notes to Mr. Steevens' Edition of Shakspeare, that the Violet is an emblem of faithfulness: to corroborate which, he gives some lines from a sonnet, published in a collection printed in the year 1584:

"Violet is for faithfulnesse

Which in me shall abide;

Hoping likewise that from your heart

You will not let it slide."

Burns speaks of the hyacinth as an emblem of fidelity: its virtue lies, it seems, in the colour, and may be extended to all flowers of true blue. The insertion of the

be readily forgiven me.

song will

"O luve will venture in, where it daur na weel be seen,
O luve will venture in, where wisdom ance has been ;
But I will down yon river rove, amang the wood sae green,
And a' to pu' a posie to my ain dear May.

* Sce Carlisle's Specimens of Arabian Poetry, 75.

"The primrose I will pu', the firstling of the year,
And I will pu' the pink, the emblem of my dear;

For she's the pink o' womankind, and blooms without a peer;
And a❜ to be a posie to my ain dear May.

"I'll pu' the budding rose, when Phoebus peeps in view,
For it's like a balmy kiss o' her sweet bonnie mou ;
The hyacinth's for constancy, wi' its unchanging blue;
And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May.

"The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair,

And in her lovely bosom, I'll place the lily there;
The daisy's for simplicity and unaffected air;
And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May.

"The hawthorn I will pu' wi' its locks o' siller gray,
Where, like an aged man, it stands at break o' day;
But the songster's nest within the bush I winna take away;
And a❜ to be a posie to my ain dear May.

“The woodbine I will pu', when the evʼning star is near,
And the diamond drops o' dew shall be her een sae clear;
The violet's for modesty, which weel she fa's to wear,
And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May.

"I'll tie the posie round wi' the silken band o' luve,

And I'll place it in her breast, and I'll swear by all abuve,
That to my latest draught of life, the band shall ne'er remove;
And this shall be a posie to my ain dear May."

Another of our rustic poets, Clare, has a poem addressed to the Violet, in the second volume of his Village Minstrel, &c.; in the first volume, in a poem entitled Holywell, he speaks of it as one of the first signs of Spring:

"And just to say the Spring was come
The violet left her woodland home,
And, hermit-like, from storms and wind
Sought the best shelter it could find,
'Neath long grass banks."

Mr. Moore, in his notes to Lalla Rookh, quotes some passages to inform us that the Sweet Violet is one of the plants most esteemed in the East, particularly for its use in sherbet; which they make with violet sugar. "The sherbet they most esteem, and which is drank by the

grand signor himself, is made of violets and sugar. TAVERNIER."

Mr. H. Smith, in his Amarynthus, speaks of this flower as being of short duration.

-" the trembling violet, which eyes

The sun but once, and unrepining dies."

The North American Violets are mostly void of scent, with the exception of the Dog's-violet, with which we are also familiar in our own hedges, as a successor to the Sweet-violet. With this exception too, the North American Violets best succeed in loam and bog earth, and should be housed in the winter.

VIPER'S BUGLOSS.

ECHIUM.

BORRAGINEÆ.

PENTANDRIA MONOGYNIA.

This plant has been supposed to cure the bite of the viper: it is also called cat's tail.-French, la viperine; l'herbe aux viperes [viper's wort].-Italian, viperina.

THE Cretan species is the handsomest of the genus: its flowers are of a red-purple; the plant produces them but once. This kind is a native of the Levant: its stalks are trailing, and about a foot in length. The top of a wall is the best place to sow it; if in a pot, it must be in a gravelly soil: it should be sown about the middle of October, and in hard frost covered with a little sawdust, straw, or oak-leaves. It will flower in July and August; and if on a wall, will scatter its own seeds, and so maintain its own continuance.

The other species must be housed in the winter: they do not produce their flowers till the second year after sowing. They must be sparingly watered, in winter particularly; the stems being succulent.

VIRGINIA COWSLIP.

DODECATHEON MEADIA.

PRIMULACEA.

PENTANDRIA MONOGYNIA.

French, gyroselle de Virginie.

THIS is a perennial plant, with purple flowers, or inclining to the colour of the peach blossom. It is very ornamental when in flower, which is in April and May.

This plant is more impatient of heat than of cold: it will endure our most severe winters; but two or three days' exposure to a hot sun will entirely destroy the young plants. It may be increased by offsets from the roots, which should be taken off, and transplanted in August, after the leaves and stalks have decayed, that they may have time to gain strength before the frost comes on.

CRUCIFERA.

WALLFLOWER.

CHEIRANTHUS.

TETRADYNAMIA SILIQUOSA.

French, giroflier jaune; violier jaune [both signifying yellow stock]; le baton d'or [gold stick]; la ravanelle; le rameau d'or [golden branch]; le garranier jaune.-Italian, viola [stock]; viola gialla [yellow stock]; cheiri.

THE Wallflowers are, in fact, Stocks; since they not only belong to the same genus, but are properly named Wallflowers, or Stocks: but some of the species having been distinguished by custom as Wallflowers, entirely