pfant "bore, Tsegei^ti/, aael T^ijrie/". 4.57 



Hence in Elysian fields are Myrtles said 



To favour lovers with their friendly shade, 



Tliere Thaidra, I'rocris (ancient poets feign), 



And Eriphyle still of love complain, 



Whose unextinguished (lames e'en after death remain. 



Nor is this all the honour Myrtles claim : 



When from the Sabine war 'I'udertus came, 



He wreathed his temples from the Myrtle grove, 



Sacred to Triumph as before to Love." 



To dream of seeing a fine Myrtle portends many lovers and a 

 legacy. If a married person dreams of Myrtle, it prognosticates a 

 second marriage. A similar dream for the second time portends a 

 second marriage to a person who has also been married before. 

 Myrtle seen in a dream denotes, as a rule, a numerous family, 

 wealth, and old age. 



NARCISSUS. — The white, or Poet's, Narcissus owes its 

 origin to a beautiful youth of Boeotia, of whom it had been foretold 

 he should live happily until he beheld his own face. Caressed and 

 petted by the Nymphs, and passionately loved by the unhappy 

 Echo, he slighted and rejecfled their advances ; but one day, when 

 heated by the chase, he stopped to quench his thirst in a stream, 

 and in so doing beheld the reflecftion of his own lovely features. 

 Enamoured instantly of his own beauty, he became spell-bound to 

 the spot, where he pined to death. Ovid relates how the flower 

 known by his name sprang from the corpse of Narcissus : — 



" As wax dissolves, as ice begins to run. 

 And trickle into drops before the sun, 

 So melts the youth, and languishes away ; 

 His beauty withers, and his limbs decay ; 

 And none of those attractive charms remain, 

 To which the slighted Echo sued in vain. 

 She saw him in his present misery. 

 Whom, spite of all her wrongs, she grieved to see ; 

 She answered sadly to the lover's moan, 

 Sighed back his sighs, and groaned to every groan. 

 ' Ah, youth belov'd in vain ! ' Narcissus cries ; 

 ' Ah, youth beloved in vain ! ' the Nymph replies. 

 ' Farewell ! ' says he ;— the parting sound scarce fell 

 From his faint lips but she replied, ' Farewell I ' 

 Then on th' unwholesome earth he gasping lies, 

 Till death shuts up those self-admiring eyes. 

 To the cold shades his flitting ghost retires, 

 And in the Stygian waves itself admires. 



For him the Naiads and the Dryads mourn, 

 Whom the sad Echo answers in her turn. 

 And now the sister-nymphs prepare his urn ; 

 When, looking for his corpse, they only found 

 A rising stalk, with yellow blossoms crown'd." — Addison. 



The cup in the centre of the flower is fabled to contain the tears of 

 Narcissus. Virgil alludes to this (Georgic IV.) when, in speaking 

 of the occupations of bees, he says : " Some place within the house 

 the tears of Narcissus." Milton also refers to this fancy in the 



