n8 NOTES. 



So after all I am as much in the dark as ever. Was 

 the mysterious flower, as some suggest, a Calendula 

 (Marygold), or an Aster? I cannot tell, and only know 

 that neither answers the description. On the whole then 

 I am disposed to wonder whether either Ovid or Pliny 

 knew much more about the matter than ourselves, and I 

 may some day come to doubt whether Clytie was ever 

 turned into a Sunflower at all. 1 



NOTE V. 



FLOWERS AND THE POETS. 



Both the flowers of the garden and what Campbell 

 calls " wildings of nature " have had their bards, and in 

 the case of certain flowers the association with a poet is 

 so strong that the sight of the flower will recall the 

 verse. Of course this is chiefly so as regards the less 

 familiar flowers. No one, not even Sappho, has an ex- 

 clusive possession in the Rose ; but who would care to 

 dispute Shelley's right to the Sensitive Plant, or Words- 

 worth's to the lesser Celandine ? The poets, however, 

 have sometimes more of a love than a knowledge of 

 plants, and Milton talks of the "twisted Eglantine " in 

 confusion between the Sweetbrier and the Honeysuckle. 



It is interesting to see the different ways in which 



1 One of our very best living authorities on such a subject has 

 sent me the suggestion that the common Salsafy, or possibly the 

 Anagallis, may be the flower, but he adds (agreeing with Gerarde), 

 "the word Heliotropium does not mean a flower which turns to 

 the sun, but which flowers at the solstice." 



