urban's tide, 143 



MAY 22. St. Yvo, confessor, a.d. 1353. 

 St. Basiliscus, martyr, 312. 

 SS. Castus and Aemilius, martyrs, 250. 

 St. Bobo, confessor, 985. 

 St. Conall, abbot in Ireland. 



Ohs. St. Yvo Helori was born in 1253 near Treguier in Britany, 

 and lived to the age of one hundred years. He is considered patron 

 of the University of Nantes. 



St. Bobo was native of Provence, where his name is held in great 

 veneration. 



Broom Spartmm scoparium full flower. 



Yellow Star of Jerusalem Tragopogon pratensis fl. 



White Lychnis Lychnis alba flowers. 



The Yellow Star of Jerusalem or Goatsbeard grows in moist meadows, and 



after blowing for about a month with a yellow flower exhibits its seeds in the 

 globular form like the Dandelion, but its globe of volatile seeds is twice tlie 

 size of the blowers of the Dandelion. 



The white field Lychnis was at first esteemed a variety of the Cuckoo 

 Flower, but it seems » lonaly, for it has, besides many characteristics, a later 

 time of flowering, and is only found in certain soils; it prefers chalk. After all, 

 what is a variety, and what is a species? One word signifyin'.' only an iippfar- 

 ance and the other a difference of appearance. The doctrine of distinctive 

 species has never been clearly madeont and defined. 



Yellow Bachelor's Button's or double varieties of Ranunculus acris now 

 flower in our gardens ; and all the Crowfoots get common in the fields. 



The full flowering of the Broom recorded today reminds one of the lines of 

 Burns : 



O the Broom, the bonny bonnj Broom, 



The Broom of the Cowdeu Knows ; 

 For suie so soft, so sweft a bloom, 



Elsewhere there never grows. 



Burns lauds it too in one of his songs, written to an Irish air, which was a 

 great favourite with him, called the Humours of Glen : 



Their groves of swcel Myrtle let foreign lands reckon, 



Where blight beaming summers exalt the perfume; 

 Far dearer to me yon lone glen o' green breckan, 



Wi' the burn stealing under the lang yellow iiroom. 

 Frtr dearer to me are yon humble broom bowers. 



Where the Bluebell and Gowan lurk lowly unseen ; 

 For there lightly tapping aniang the sweet flowers, 



A listening the l.iunet, oft wanders my Jean. 



'Twas that delightful season, when the Broom 

 FuUflowered, and visible on every steep. 

 Along the copses runs in veins of gold. 



IP'ordsworth's Poems, 8vo. vol. ii. p. litio. 



Thomson speaks of it as a favourite food of kine : 



Yellow and bright, as bullion unalloyed. 



Her blossoms. Cowper's Tusk. 



Broom is said to make a pleasant shade for a lounger in the su:nmer, seem- 

 ing to embody the sunshine, while it intercepts its heat. 



6 



