CHAPTER XVII. MODERN 

 PANSIES AND THEIR CULTURE 



MODERN pansies are what Mark 

 Twain would have called violets 

 with a college education. They 

 far excel that modest wayside 

 flower in size, shape, and infinite 

 variety of coloring, and their 

 fragrance is even more thrilling. 



In view of the fact that there are more than 

 two hundred species of violets, this last claim 

 may seem rash and reckless. I haven't nosed 

 them all, and I admit that there are few things 

 in this world so delicious as the fragrance of 

 the white Parma violet (pallida plena) or of 

 the tiny Viola blanda which hides itself along 

 the mossy, cool banks of trout brooks and 

 rivulets; but at any rate I feel that the poets, 

 who are forever raving over the sweetness of 

 the violets (most of which have no scent at all), 

 have failed to do justice to the pansy's entrancing 

 fragrance. 



To throw a perfume on the violet is called 

 by Shakespeare "wasteful and ridiculous excess," 

 like painting the lily, gilding refined gold, or 

 adding another line to the rainbow. Shake- 

 speare, Milton, and other poets also refer to the 

 pansies. They are called by various pet names, 

 such as love-in-idleness, heartsease; but to 

 their fragrance I can find no allusion in English 

 poetry. 



