SPRING FLOWERS. 49 



were true. The fact, we take it, is that if the 

 two varieties are placed together the stronger one 

 will gradually get possession of the ground, and 

 supplant the more delicate yellow, just as (as old 

 Waterton used to say) the Hanoverian rats turned 

 out the old brown rat of the country. 



Other Spring flowers are far less cultivated in 

 great gardens than in those of less pretension ; 

 but no flowers give more pleasure, both from their 

 own beauty, and as being among the first flowers 

 of the year. There are the auricula, or " Easier " 

 (as it is called in Lancashire ballads), with its 

 velvet petals and its powdered leaves ; the double 

 primrose, faint smelling of the spring ; the hepa- 

 tica, whose bright little blossoms sparkle like 

 unset gems ; the pulmonaria, with blossoms half 

 blue, half red, and milk-stained leaves, for which 

 sacred legends can alone account. Then, above 

 all, are the daffodils, most loved of flowers by the 

 poets, though, once again, in preference to any 

 poet, as less known yet admirable in their way, 

 I will quote a few words from Forbes Watson's 

 book. " The daffodil," he says, " is a plant which 



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