CHRYSANTHEMUMS 



IV 



NEVERTHELESS, thanks to some forget- 

 fulness of nature, the most unusual 

 colour in the world of flowers and the 

 most severely forbidden the colour 

 which the corolla of the poisonous eu- 

 phorbia is almost the only one to wear 

 in the city of the umbels, petals and 

 calyces green, the colour exclusively 

 reserved for the servile and nutrient 

 leaves, has penetrated within the jeal- 

 ously-guarded precinfts. True, it has 

 slipped in only by favour of a lie, as a 

 traitor, a spy, a livid deserter. It is a for- 

 sworn yellow, steeped fearfully in the 

 fugitive azure of the moonbeam. It is 

 still of the night and false, like the opal 

 C95 ] 



