Tussy-mussies 299 



The greatest pleasure in flower perfumes comes 

 to us through the first flowers of spring. How 

 we breathe in their sweetness ! Our native wild 

 flowers give us the most delicate odors. The May- 

 flower is, I believe, the only wild flower for which 

 all country folk of New England have a sincere 

 affection ; it is not only a beautiful, an enchanting 

 flower, but it is so fresh, so balmy of bloom. It 

 has the delicacy of texture and form characteristic 

 of many of our native spring blooms, Hepatica, 

 Anemone, Spring Beauty, Polygala. 



The Arethusa was one of the special favorites of 

 my father and mother, who delighted in its exquisite 

 fragrance. Hawthorne said of it : " One of the deli- 

 catest, gracefullest, and in every manner sweetest of 

 the whole race of flowers. For a fortnight past I 

 have found it in the swampy meadows, growing up 

 to its chin in heaps of wet moss. Its hue is a deli- 

 cate pink, of various depths of shade, and somewhat 

 in the form of a Grecian helmet." 



It pleases me to fancy that Hawthorne was like 

 the Arethusa, that it was a fit symbol of the nature 

 of our greatest New England genius. Perfect in 

 grace and beauty, full of sentiment, classic and 

 elegant of shape, it has a shrinking heart ; the 

 sepals and petals rise over it and shield it, and the 

 whole flower is shy and retiring, hiding in marshes 

 and quaking bogs. 



It is one of our flowers which we ever regard 

 singly, as an individual, a rare and fine spirit ; we 

 never think of it as growing in an expanse or even 

 in groups. This lovely flower has, as Landor said 



