I. YIOLA. 25 



With us, she is but a winter's flower; 



The snow on the hills cannot blast her bower, 



And she lifts up her dewy eye of blue 



To the youngest sky of the selfsame hue, 



And when the Spring comes, with her host 

 Of flowers, that flower beloved the most 

 Shrinks from the crowd that may confuse 

 Her heavenly odour, and virgin hues. 



Pluck the others, but still remember 

 Their herald out of dim December, 

 The morning star of all the flowers, 

 The pledge of daylight's lengthened hours, 

 Nor, midst the roses, e'er forget 

 The virgin, virgin violet." * 



3. It is the queen, not only of the violet tribe, but of 

 all low-growing flowers, in sweetness of scent variously 

 applicable and serviceable in domestic economy : the 

 scent of the lily of the valley seerns less capable of pres- 

 ervation or use. 



But, respecting these perpetual beneficences and be- 

 nignities of the sacred, as opposed to the malignant, 

 herbs, whose poisonous power is for the most part re- 



* A careless bit of Byron's, (the last song but one in the ' Deformed 

 Transformed'); but Byron's most careless work is better, by its in- 

 nate energy, than other people's most laboured. I suppress, in some 

 doubts about my ' digamma,' notes on the Greek violet and the Ion 

 of Euripides; which the reader will perhaps be good enough to 

 fancy a serious loss to him, and supply for himself . 



