ISO FLORA HISTORICA. 



AMARANTH. Amaranthiis. 



Natural Order Miscellanece, Lin. Amaranthi, Juss : a 

 Genus of the Monoecia Pentandria Class. 



** Sad Amaranthus, in whose purple gore 

 Me seems I see Amintas wretched fate, 

 To whom sweet poets verse hath given endlesse date." 



Spenser. 



The Amaranth flower is made the emblem of 

 immortality, and the bards have placed it in the 

 list of funeral flowers, because the father of 

 poetry has described the Thessalians as wearing 

 crowns of Amaranths at the funeral of Achilles. 



Milton mentions this flower as forming the 

 diadem of angels, and the plant itself seems im- 

 mortaUzed by the power of his majestic pen : 



** With solemn adoration down they cast 



Their crowns inwove with Amaranth and gold ; 



Immortal Amaranth, a flower which once 



In Paradise, fast by the tree of life. 



Began to bloom, but soon for man's offence 



To heaven reraoved, where first it grew, there groM's 



And flowers aloft, shading the font of life. 



And where the river of bliss through midst of heaven 



Rolls o'er Elysian flowers her amber stream ; 



With these that never fade/' 



