258 FLORA HISTORICA. 



She spent her days, her pleasing task to tend 



The flowers ; to lave them from the water-spring ; 



To ope the buds with her enamour'd breath, 



Rank the gay tribes, and rear them in the sun. 



Thus plied assiduous her delightful task, 



Day after day, till every herb she named 



That paints the robe of Spring. 



The plant, which botanists now distinguish by 

 the name of Erythronium, appears not to have been 

 brought into notice before the middle of the six- 

 teenth century, an age when the most eminent 

 physicians of Europe turned their particular atten- 

 tion to the study of botany. Gerard, who wrote 

 on this plant about the end of that century, ob- 

 serves, " there hath not long since been found out 

 a goodly bulbose plant, and termed Satyrion." 

 Lobel, a native of Lisle, seems to have given it 

 this name, supposing it to be the true Satyrion of 

 Dioscorides. Lobel most probably met with the 

 plant in his travels through Switzerland, Germany, 

 and Italy, from whence he probably brought it to 

 England, as he settled in this countrv about the 

 year 1570, and undertook the superintendence of 

 Lord Z ouclVs botanical garden at Hackney. In 

 1596, we find the plant was cultivated in Holborn, 

 but Gerard does not mention from whom he re- 

 ceived it. Lobel afterwards w r as appointed physician 

 and botanist to James the First of England. Mat- 

 thiolus, a celebrated physician of Sienna, who died 



