60 THE BEAUTIES OF APRIL AND MAY. 



fumes through various vicissitudes and alternations of the 

 season, while others make a transient visit only. 



"I love thee, lone and pensive flower, 



Because thou dost not flaunt thy bloom 

 In pleasure's gay and garnish' d bower, 



Or luxury's proud banquet room ; 

 But on the silent, mouldering wall 



Thy clinging leaves a fragrance shed, 

 Or give to the deserted hall, 



A relic of its glories fled. 



M These wreaths, in vivid freshness bright, 



Methinks the fluttering herd portray, 

 Who bask on fortune's golden light, 



And wanton in her joyous way ; 

 But thou art like that gentle love, 



Which blooms when friends and fame have pass' d, 

 Towers the dark wreck of hope above. 



And smiles through ruin to the last." 



In favoured climates arises the Anemone, encircled al 

 the bottom with, a spreading robe, and rounded at the top 

 into a beautiful dome. In its loosely-flowing mantle, you 

 may observe a noble negligence ; in its gently-bending tufts, 

 the nicest symmetry. This may be termed the fine gentle- 

 man of the garden, because it seems to possess the means of 

 uniting simplicity and refinement, of reconciling art and ease. 

 The same month has the merit of producing the Ranunculus. 

 All bold and graceful, it expands the riches of its foliage, and 

 acquires by degrees the lovliest enamel in the world. As 

 persons of intrinsic worth disdain the superficial arts of recom- 

 mendation practised by fops, so this lordly flower scorns to 

 borrow any of its excellencies from powders and essences. 

 It needs no such attractions to render it the darlin g of the 

 cuiious, being sufficiently engaging from the elegance of its 

 figure, the radiant variety of its tinges, and a certain superior 

 dignity of aspect. 



JUNE. 

 'Now have young April, and the blue-eyed May, 

 Vanished awhile, and lo ! the glorious June 

 (While Nature ripens in his burning noon) 

 Comes like a young inheritor." 



