194 FLORA DOMESTICA. 



" Hyacinth, with sapphire bell 

 Curling backward." 



Hunt's Mask. 



" Some deep empurpled as the Hyacinth, 

 Some as the Rubin laughing sweetly red. 

 Some like fair Emeraudes, not yet well ripened." 



Here Spenser, speaking of the various colours of the 

 grapes according to their ripeness, expressly distinguishes 

 the purple of the Hyacinth from the red, which was very 

 similar to the Roman purple. 



It has been common to compare the Hyacinth to curls ; 

 and the curling of its petals is common to both flov/ers ; 

 though perhaps the modern Hyacinth, in its form, bears 

 more resemblance to a cluster of hair-curls : 



" and hyacinthine locks 



Round from his parted forelock manly hung 

 Clustering." 



Collins has the same simile in his Ode to Liberty : 



" The youths whose locks divinely spreading. 

 Like vernal Hyacinths in sullen hue." 



It occurs again in Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia : 



" It was the excellently fair Queen Helen, whose jacinth hair curled 

 by nature, but intercurled by art, like a fine brook through golden sands, 

 had a rope of fair pearl, which now hiding, now hidden by the hair, 

 did, as it were, play at fast and loose each with other, mutually giving 

 and receiving richness." 



The Persian poet, Hafiz, also compares the dark Hya- 

 cinth to the locks of his mistress '*. Lord Byron makes 

 the same comparison, as also does Sir W. Jones re- 



* See the notes to Moore's Lalla Rookh. 



