V. PAPAVER RHOEAS. 99 



have been said of a pimpernel, or scarlet geranium ; 

 — but of neither of these latter should I have said 

 " robed in purple of Caesars." What I meant was, 

 first, that the poppy leaf looks dyed through and 

 through, like glass, or Tyrian tissue ; and not 

 merely painted : secondly, that the splendour of it 

 is proud, — almost insolently so. Augustus, in his 

 glory, might have been clothed like one of these ; 

 and Saul ; but not David, nor Solomon ; still less 

 the teacher of Solomon, when He puts on ' glorious 

 apparel.' 



3. Let us look, however, at the two translations of 

 the same verse. 



In the Vulgate it is " Dominus regnavit ; decorem 

 indutusest;" He has put on ' becomingness,' — decent 

 apparel, rather than glorious. 



In the Septuagint it is evirptTraa — zvell-becommg- 

 ness ; an expression which, if the reader considers, 

 must imply certainly the existence of an opposite 

 idea of possible 'z'//-becomingness,' — of an apparel 

 which should, in just as accurate a sense, belong 

 appropriately to the creature invested with it, and 

 yet not be glorious, but inglorious, and not well- 

 becoming, but ill-becoming. The mandrill's blue 

 nose, for instance, already referred to, — can we 

 rightly speak of this as ' evirpeireia ' ? Or the stings, 

 and minute, colourless blossoming of the nettle ? 



