52 FROM A MIDDLESEX GARDEN 



whether the daffodil is really indigenous to Great Britain. 

 Nevertheless, we regard it as our own Spring blossom, 

 coming what time 



" March makes sweet the weather 

 With daffodil and starling, 



And hours of fruitful breath." 



With the daffodil (Narcissus) the following beautiful 

 classic myth is associated. "Narcissus, a beautiful youth, 

 son of Cephissus and Liriope, was inaccessible to the feeling 

 of love ; and the nymph Echo, who was enamoured of him, 

 died of grief. But Nemesis, to punish him, caused him to 

 see his own image reflected in a fountain, whereupon he 

 became so enamoured of it, that he gradually pined away, 

 until he was metamorphosed into the flower which bears his 

 name." Those old herbalists, Gerard and Parkinson, have 

 written in their delightful and quaint volumes on the 

 daffodil. John Gerard, in his " Herball" (London, 1597) 

 says : " Daffodil, or Narcissus, is of two sorts ; the flowers 

 are both white, the one having in the middle a purple circle 

 or coronet, the other with a yellow cuppe. . . . The first 

 of the daffodils is that with the purple crowne or circle, 

 having small, narrow leaves, thick, fat, and full of slimie 

 juice, among which riseth up a naked stalke, smoothe and 

 hollow, of a foote high, bearing at the top a fair, milk-white 

 flower, growing forth of a hood, or thin filme, such as onions 

 are wrapped in." Parkinson, in his " Paradise in Sole," &c. 

 (London, 1629), says: " There hath beene great confusion 

 among many of our moderne writers of plants, distinguishing 

 the manifold varieties of daffodils ; for every one almost, 

 without consideration of kinds or forme or other speciale 

 note, give the name so diversly one from another." He first 

 mentions in his book having for its second title, " A Garden 



