210 A BUNCH OF HERBS. 



dashing the road-sides with tints of purple and gold, 

 he found them scentless also. " Where are your fra- 

 grant flowers ? " he might well say. " I can find none." 

 Let him look closer and penetrate our forests, and 

 visit our ponds and lakes. Let him compare our 

 matchless, rosy-lipped, honey-hearted trailing arbutus 

 with his own ugly ground-ivy (Nepeta Glechoma) ; let 

 him compare our sumptuous fragrant pond-lily with 

 his own odorless N. alba. In our Northern woods 

 he shall find the floors carpeted with the delicate 

 Linnaea, its twin rose-colored, nodding flowers filling 

 the air with fragrance. (I am aware that the Linnaea 

 is found in some parts of ' Northern Europe.) The 

 fact is, we perhaps have as many sweet-scented wild 

 flowers as Europe has, only they are not quite so 

 prominent in our flora, and so well known to our 

 people or to our poets. 



Think of Wordsworth's " Golden Daffodils " : 



"I wandered lonely as a cloud 



That floats on high o'er vales and hills, 

 When, all at once, I saw a crowd, 



A host of golden daffodils, 

 Beside the lake, beneath the trees, 

 Fluttering and dapcing in the breeze. 



"Continuous as the stars that shine 

 And twinkle on the milky way, 

 They stretched in never-ending line 



Along the margin of a bay. 

 Ten thousand saw I at a glance, 

 Tossing their heads in sprightly dance." 



No such sight could greet the poet's eye hera 



