(Turning to thee, divine Philosophy,
Ever at hand to calm his troubled soul)
Sailed slowly by, two thousand years ago,
For Athens; when a ship, if north-east winds
Blew from the Pæstan gardens, slacked her course.

ROGERS ITALY.

THE ALPINE VIOLET.

THE spring is come, the Violet 's gone,
The first-born child of the early sun;
With us she is but a winter flower,

The snow on the hills cannot blast her bower;
And she lifts up her dewy eye of blue,

To the youngest sky of the self same hue.

And when the spring comes, with her host
Of flowers, that flower beloved the most,
Shrinks from the crowd that may confuse,
Her heavenly odours and virgin hues.

Pluck the others, but still remember
Their herald, out of dim December;

The morning star of all the flowers,
The pledge of daylight's lengthened hours;
Amid the roses ne'er forget

The virgin, virgin Violet.

The Wood Sorrel

Oxalis Acetosella.

Class Decandria. Order Pentagynia.

66

ONE of the most elegant of our woodland plants. The flowers are solitary, drooping, bell-shaped, either white or purplish, always streaked with fine branching purple veins." The fresh and delicate green of the trefoil-shaped leaves, contrasts beautifully with the decaying wood and beds of withered leaves from which they often spring. From their powerful and most agreeable acid, a salt is prepared, known by the name of essential salt of lemon. The root of small reddish scaly clusters, connected by a thread-like stalk, is singular, and adds to the beauty of the plant. When the dark shining seeds are ripe, they are projected to a distance, upon the slightest touch or motion, by their elastic tunics, which remain contracted and wrinkled in the capsule.

ARUM, that in a mantling hood conceals

Her sanguine club, and spreads her spotted leaf, Armed with keen tortures for the unwary tongue. Anemone, now robed in virgin white,

Now blushing with faint crimson:

Sorrel, that hangs her cups,

Ere their frail form and streaky veins decay,
O'er her pale verdure, till parental care
Inclines the shortening stems, and to the shade
Of closing leaves her infant race withdraws.

HURDIS' WALKS IN A FOREST.

THEN, thickly strewn in woodland bowers,
Anemones their stars unfold;

There spring the Sorrel's veined flowers,

And rich in vegetable gold,

From calyx pale, the freckled cowslip born,

Receives in amber cups the fragrant dews of morn.

CHARLOTTE SMITH.

The Cowslip.

Primula Veris.

Class Pentandria. Order Monogynia.

COWSLIPS, so simple, yet so exquisitely finished, are plentiful in the meadows and pastures of England and other parts of Europe, though only upon a soil of clay or chalk. The sweet orange-freckled flowers communicate their aromatic fragrance and narcotic quality to the wine made from them, which is said to resemble the Muscat of the south of France. These blossoms were poetically deemed a fit resort for fairies, even before Shakspeare had so consecrated them.

ARIEL'S SONG.

WHERE the bee sucks, there suck I;

In a Cowslip's bell I lie:

There I couch when owls do cry.

On the bat's back I do fly
After summer, merrily;

Merrily, merrily, shall I live now,

Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

TEMPEST.

EMPLOYMENT OF A FAIRY.

I DO wander every where,
Swifter than the moone's sphere;
And I serve the fairy queen,
To dew her orbs upon the green:
The Cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see;
Those be rubies, fairy favours,
In those freckles live their savours:
I must go seek some dew-drops here,
And hang a pearl in every Cowslip's ear.

MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.

WHILST from off the waters fleet

Thus I set my printless feet

O'er the Cowslip's velvet head,

That bends not as I tread;

Gentle swain, at thy request,

I am here.

MILTON'S COMUS.