OUR PASTORAL LIFE. 239 



The peculiar sweetness and felicity of this simile requires, perhaps, a 

 loving and poetic nature for its full reception, and may have eluded 

 our hamlet's simple tenantry. But they spoke of their favourite, 

 even when a girl, as being the Lily-of-our-valley ; and there was more 

 aptness in the comparison than, it may be, they weeted. 



" With slender stalk and modest humble mien, 

 I saw the floweret with its head reclined." 



But when hectic had tinted the cheek, the friends spoke simply of 

 that increase in her beauty, which the poet has sought to convey 

 ever in floral imagery. Many have seen there the struggle between 

 the Lily and the Rose, but he was more familiar with our wildings who 

 thither for his colours and his symbol : — 



" The wild Rose, (emblem, and resemblance too, 

 Of beauty without art,) breathing its faint, 

 Delicious life, peeps thro' the hawthorn hedge. 

 Half pale, half red, like pining beauty's cheek." 



As again the end drew nigh there was about her a hallowed in- 

 fluence, 



" With richer fragrance breathed the simple flower, 



which reminded the poet that the Violet more becomingly symbolized 

 one who had always veiled her beauty, and who now dying, and after 

 death, continued to breathe rich odours to whomsoever loved her 

 favourite name and nourished her memory * : — 



" The summer winds sing lullaby 



O'er Mary's early grave. 

 And the summer flowers spring tenderly 



O'er her their buds to wave. 

 For oh ! her life was short and sweet. 

 As the flowers which blossom at her feet ! " 



His sister's fate mellowed the character of the tale-loving brother. 

 Following the occupation of his father, he had grown to be a shep- 



* " Yet, though thou fade, 



From thy dead leaves let fragrance rise ; 

 And teach the maid 



That goodness Time's rude hand defies, — 



That virtue lives when beauty dies." — H. K. White. 



" Louisa herself was one of the violets of the world ; nothing could be 

 gentler or kinder. She seemed never to think of herself." — Southey. 

 Life and Corresp. vi. p. 85. 



" Whence is it, that the flowret of the field doth fade. 

 And lyeth buried long in Winter's vale ; 

 Yet, soone as Spring his mantle hath displaj'de, 

 It flowreth fresh, as it should never fayle ? 

 But thing on earth that is of most availe. 

 As vertues branch and beauties bud, 

 Reliven not for any good." — Spenser. 



The Shepheard's Calender. 



