IN LEAF.

Green as thou art, obscurely green,
Meanest of plants among the mean!
From the dust I took my birth;

Thou too art a child of earth.

I aspire not to be great;

Scorn not thou my low estate :
Wait the time, and thou shalt see
Honour crown humility;

Beauty set her seal on me.

IN FLOWER.

Blue thou art, intensely blue!
Flower, whence came thy dazzling hue?
When I opened first mine eye,
Upward glancing to the sky,
Straightway from the firmament,
Was the sapphire brilliance sent ;
Brighter glory wouldst thou share?
Look to heaven, and seek it there,
In the act of faith and prayer.

The genus, Gentiana, which is said to be so called in honour of a royal botanist, Gentius, king of Illyria, who, as Pliny says, first discovered its tonic properties, is placed in the Linnæan class Pentandria, and order Digynia; and gives its own name to the Natural order Gentianeæ.

THE DAFFODIL.

Pseudo-Narcissus; L. Narcisse; Fr. Die narcisse; Ger. Narcis; Dutch. Narciso; Ital. and Sp. Narcizo; Port. Narcisse; Dan. Narsiss; Swed.

O! Proserpina,

For the flowers now, that frighted, thou let'st fall
From Dis's wagon! Daffodils,

That come before the swallow dares, and take

The winds of March with beauty.

SHAKSPEARE.

THE family to which our present subject belongs is a very numerous one, and its various members are all beautiful. This perhaps is the only true native of our island, and may therefore be justly regarded as the British type of the tribe of plants commonly known by the name of Narcissus. The common

Daffodil springs from an egg-shaped bulb, which is covered with a dark brown membrane; its leaves, which are linear, obtuse, and erect, make their appearance about the middle of February, and attain the height of eight or twelve inches; and between them rises the scape to about the same height, or perhaps to a greater, which is terminated by a single yellow flower, on a short footstalk, with a tube of no great length, its mouth being surrounded by a large bellshaped crown of a rich gold colour, the margin divided more or less deeply into six dentated imperfect segments of circles.

The common Daffodil is frequent in the damp fields and moist meadows in different parts of England, and has an undoubted claim to be classed amongst the more beautiful of our favourite field flowers. In certain dis

tricts in the Midland counties it is so abundant as to lead a stranger to imagine that they have been planted for a crop, rather than that they grow there merely in a wild state. It has also been introduced into the garden; but if pampered with richer soil than that of its native fields, the flower loses its light and elegant appearance, and becomes double and heavy.

The Daffodil has frequently been introduced into poetry and made the theme of song. Spenser, in "The Faëry Queen," describes the black-eyed Cymoint, the mother of Marinell, as receiving the intelligence that he was slain by Britomartis, when

She played

Among her watery sisters, by a pond,
Gathering sweet Daffodillies, to have made

Gay garlands, from the sun their foreheads fair to shade.
Eftsoons both flowers and garlands far away she flung,
And her fair dewy locks yrent.

We are told that there was an annual festival on which Daffodils were scattered upon the flowing stream of the Severn, a custom to which Milton refers in Comus.

There is a gentle nymph not far from hence,

That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn stream,
Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure ;

Whilom, she was the daughter of Locrine,
That had the sceptre from his father Brute.
She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit
Of her enraged step-dame, Guendolen,
Commended her fair innocence to the flood,
That staid her flight with his cross flowing course.
The water nymphs, that in the bottom played,
Held up their pearled wrists, and took her in,
Bearing her straight to aged Nereus' hall;

Who, piteous of her woes, reared her lank head,
And gave her to his daughters to imbathe
In nectared lavers, strewed with asphodel;
And through the porch and inlet of each sense
Dropt in ambrosial oils, till she revived,
And underwent a quick immortal change,
Made goddess of the river: still she retains
Her maiden gentleness, and oft at eve
Visits the herds among the twilight meadows,
Helping all urchin blasts, and ill-luck signs
That the shrewd meddling elf delights to make,
Which she with precious vialed liquors heals;
For which the shepherds at their festivals
Carol her goodness loud in rustic lays,

And throw sweet garland wreaths into her stream,
Of pansies, pinks, and gaudy Daffodils.

Dryden also commemorates the same custom :

The daughters of the flood have searched the mead
For violets pale, and cropped the poppy's head;
The short Narcissus and fair Daffodil ;

Pansies to please the sight, and cassia sweet to smell.

Dr. Wordsworth was so struck with the appearance of a large number of the Daffodil in bloom, that he recorded his feelings in four very pretty verses ;feelings which were not limited in their influence to the time when he was gazing upon these beautiful flowers, but excited a gladdening power upon his mind when in retirement.

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host of golden Daffodils;
Beside the lake, beside the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle in the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay :
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company;

I gazed and gazed-but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought :

For oft when on my couch I lie,

In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the Daffodils.

How different, yet how beautiful, are Robert Herrick's lines on Daffodils :

Faire Daffodils, we weep to see you haste away so soon;
As yet the early rising sun has not attained his noon.
Stay, stay, until the hasting day has run

But to the even-song;

And having prayed together, we

Will goe with you along.

We have short time to stay as you; we have as short a spring;

As quick a growth to meet decay, as you, or anything.

We die as your hours doe, and drie away,

Like to the summer's raine,

Or as the pearles of morning's dew,

Ne'er to be found againe.

The common Daffodil (Narcissus Pseudo-Narcissus) is placed in the Linnæan class Hexandria, and order Monogynia; and in the Natural order Amaryllidea.