fS 97 . 



GARDENING. 



115 



NARCISSUS POETICOS BORDERING A WALK ON THE ESTATE OF JOHN L. GARDNER. ESQ.. BROOKLINE, MASS. 



ing aroused the muse in Milton, Shelley, 

 Cowper, Keats, Addison, and others. 



The mythologists considered it the em- 

 blem of egotism because there lived a 

 fabled youth whom fate decreed should 

 live a happy life until he beheld his own 

 face. Luckih- this was before the day of 

 looking-glasses or he would never have 

 lived to have outgrown knickerbockers. 

 One day when thirst compelled him to 

 drink from a woodland stream he beheld 

 the reflection of his own features and fell 

 in love with them. It is said "He was 

 spellbound to the spot, where he pined to 



death, and was metamorphosed by the 

 gods into the flower that bears his name. 

 When the Naiads had prepared the funeral 

 pile for Narcissus his body was missing. 

 Instead whereof a yellow flower was 

 found, with tufts of white about the 

 button crowned." 

 Shelley refers to it in the following lines: 



The pied windflowers and the tulip tall 

 And Narcissi, the fairest among them all, 

 Who gaze on their eyes in the stream's recess 

 Till they die of their own dear loveliness. 



The habitat of the original species of 

 the narcissus is confined chiefly to Europe, 



North Africa and North and South Asia, 

 the N. poeticus being from Southern 

 Europe. 



Cultivation has produced many named 

 varieties all worthy of cultivation, but 

 for naturalizing or for large borders A r . 

 poeticus is probably the best. It seems 

 to thrive in almost am* soil and position, 

 doing well in partial shade. When left 

 undisturbed for a few years it multiplies 

 in numbers and increases the size of its 

 flowers. 



Our beautiful illustration from a photo- 

 graph taken on the estate of John h- 



