76 



THE CANADIAN HORTICULTURIST. 



can smell its coming". The snow is g^one 

 from the g-arden walks and some of the open 

 beds ; you walk warily down the softened 

 path at midday, and you smell the earth as 

 it basks in the sun, and a faint scent comes 

 from some twig-s and leaves. Both speak 

 of summer, not of spring ; and the fragrance 

 from that Cedar tree is equally suggestive of 

 summer. But break off that slender branch 

 of calycanthus, how fresh and welcome its 

 delightful spring scent. Carry it into the 

 house with branches of- forsythia, and how 

 quickly one fills its leaf buds and the other 

 blossoms. 



"Viola tricolor. — For several years the first 

 blossom of the new year in our garden was 

 neither the snowdrop or crocus, but the 

 Ladies' Delight, that laughing, speaking 

 little garden face, which is not really a spring 

 flower, it is a stray from summer; but it is 

 such a shrewd, intelligent little creature that 

 it readily found out that spring was here ere 

 man or other flowers knew it. This dear 

 little primitive of the pansy tribe has become 

 wonderfully scarce save in cherished old 

 gardens like those of Salem, where I saw 

 this year a space thirty feet long and several 

 feet wide, under flowering shrubs and 

 bushes, wholly covered with the everyday, 

 homely little blooms of Ladies' Delight. 

 They have the partly colored petal of the 

 existing strain of English pansies, distinct 

 from the French and German pansies, and I 

 doubt notarethedescendants of the cherished 

 garden children of the English settlers. 

 Gerarde describes this little English pansy 

 or Heartease in 1587 under the name of 

 Viola tricolor. 



" The flowers in form and figure like the 

 violet, and for the most part of the same 

 bignesse, of three sundry colors, purple, 

 yellow and white or blue, by reason of the 

 beauty and braverie of which colors they are 

 very pleasing to the eye, for smell they have 

 little or none." 



"In Breck's Book of Flowers, 1851, is the 



first printed reference I find to the flower 

 under the name Ladies' Delight. In my 

 childhood I never heard it called aught else; 

 but it has a score of folk names, all testify- 

 ing to an affectionate intimacy, Bird's-eye ; 

 Garden-gate ; Johnny-jump-up ; None-so- 

 pretty ; Kitty-come ; Kit-run-about ; Three- 

 faces-under-a-hood ; Come-and-cuddle-me ; 

 Pink-of-my-Joan ; Kiss-me ; Tickle-my-fancy ; 

 Kiss-me-ere-I-rise ; Jump-up-and-kiss-me. 

 To our little flower has also been given this 

 folk name, Meet-her-in-the-entry-kiss-her- 

 in-the-buttery, the longest plant name in the 

 English language, rivalled only by Miss 

 Jedyll's triumph of momenclature for the 

 Stonecrop, namely, Welcome-home-husband- 

 be-he-ever-so-drunk. 



"These little Ladies' Delights have infinite 

 variety of expression, some are laughing and 

 roguish, some sharp and shrewd, some sur- 

 prised, others worried, all are animated and 

 vivacious, and a few saucy to a degree. 

 They are as companionable as people, nay, 

 mor§ ; they are as companionable as child- 

 ren. No wonder children love them ; they 

 recognize kindred spirits. I know a child 

 who picked unbidden a choice rose, and 

 hid it under her apron. But as she passed 

 a bed of Ladies' Delights blowing in the 

 wind, peering winking, mocking, she sud- 

 denly threw the rose at them, crying out 

 pettishly, 'Here, take your old flower.' 



' 'The dandelion is to many the golden seal 

 of spring, but it blooms the whole circle or 

 the year in sly garden corners and in the 

 grass. Of it might have been written the 

 lines : — 



" It smiles upon the lap of May, 



To sultry August spreads its charms, 

 Lights pale October on its way. 

 And twines December's arms." 



" I have picked both Ladies' Delights and 

 dandelions every month in the year. 



"I suppose the common crocus would not 

 be deemed a very great garden ornament in 

 midsummer, in its lowly growth ; but in its 



