MARTAGON LILY. 181 



MRS. F. 



You are right. Esther; and let us hear from you, the reasons 

 for this conclusion. 



According to the fable, when Apollo changed the blood 

 of Hyacinthus into a flower, he inscribed the characters M 

 upon its petals. Now the flowers of our hyacinth (indepen- 

 dent of the color being different from that assigned to the 

 hyacinth of the ancients) has no spots whatever upon the 

 petals, whereas, on the other hand, by some assistance from 

 the imagination, these letters may be traced in the dark, 

 blackish spots of the Martagon lily,* with which, in other 

 respects, the description of the ancient Hyacinth coincides, 

 it being described of an iron red or Roman purple, which is 

 the color of the common Martagon; and the curling of the 

 petals, being common to both flowers, there can be no objec- 

 tion on that point. 



MARY. 



I did not like to interrupt you just now; but what did you 

 mean, mamma, by calling the shells which produce the purple 



mollusca? 



MRS. F. 



It was the animal they contain, which I so called, not the 

 shell, which is merely its covering. Mollusca form one of 

 Cuvier's four great divisions! of the animal kingdom, and 

 are defined to be without a skeleton, with white blood, their 

 muscles attached only to their skin, which forms a soft re- 

 tractile covering, on which, in many species, are produced 

 those strong plates which we call shells. 



HENRIETTA. 



Then this is conchology. 



* Martyn. 



f He divides the animal kingdom into vertebrated, molluscous, 

 articulated, and radiated animals. 

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