506 CRITICAL NOTICES 0F NEW PUBLICATIONS. 
We should like here to stretch our reviewing privilege so far as to 
quote full seventeen pretty stanzas of the fair writer in further illus- 
tration of the Primrose; but the above extracts will shew how well 
Miss Twamley contrives to combine useful instruction with observa- 
tions suggested by feeling and fancy ; and to us this constitutes a very 
great charm of her book. More than two hundred and fifty wild 
flowers and shrubs are described in it ; and concerning each we find 
some information of a pleasing and useful kind. The grouping of 
the flowers in the plates is of itself indicative of the deepest love of 
nature, and the utmost refinement of taste. Some of them make us 
even restless in our study ; impatient to sally forth into the woods 
and lanes where the originals flourish. For instance, the group of 
blue and white violets in Plate III, which brings the heavenly perfume 
of that retiring flower fresh to the sense. But we shall let our little 
friend Agnes speak :— 
“ Violets ! violets ! beautiful, sweet, blue violets !” cried she, skip- 
ping off to gather some: “oh, how deliciously they smell! but you 
saw them first, Aunt Lucy.” 
“‘T smelt them and pointed them, my dear, leaving you the plea- 
sure of securing the game; and well knew I should receive my 
share,” she continued, as Agnes presented a delicate little bunch of 
the sweet flowers and their dark-green leaves. “I always think the 
first violets of spring are the sweetest-seeming flowers of the whole 
ear.” 
we I wish you would write me something about them, then, Aunt 
Lucy, will you?” 
“Oh! I do not promise to give you both rhyme and reason for 
all our treasures; aud you may find hosts of sweet things written of 
violets from time immemorial: for Sir Walter Scott said, very truly, 
that 
‘ The violet in her greenwood bower, 
Where birchen boughs with hazels mingle, 
May boast herself the fairest flower 
In glen, or copse, or forest dingle.’ 
And all poets, in all ages, have sung her praises. One of our mo- 
derns, the illustrious Thomas Moore, makes some quotations in his 
Lalla Rookh, to show us that these dainty flowers are made use of 
practically, as well as poetically, in the east, where the most esteemed 
sherbet is flavoured with them. They are made scientifically ser- 
viceable here in the form of a syrup, which detects an acid or alkali 
in chemical compounds, by turning red with the former, and green 
with the latter. Violets are cultivated for this purpose at Stratford- 
on-Avon, aud very appropriately ; for our immortal Shakspeare, by 
his often mention, proves his love of them ; and their perfume around 
his native place seems to my fancy a fit and delicate tribute to his 
memory. We are fortunate in having both blue and white sweet vio- 
lets in our neighbourhood, for in some localities the blue are not 
