122 GARDEN FLOWERS. 



ornament of our gardens, so old that we know 

 not whence it came originally, though it is ge- 

 nerally thought to be a native flower of some 

 part of India. 



The lily, interesting to us by its historical 

 associations, and leading us by its very name 

 to think of the tender charge of our Saviour to 

 the trembling disciples, " Consider the lilies," — 

 the Hly, the tall white lily, (Liliimi candidum,) 

 may now be seen in its beauty and purity, 

 towering above all the other flowers ; and we 

 can say with Bernard Barton, 



" Ye loftier lilies, bathed in morning dew 

 Of purity and innocence, renew 

 Each lovely thought." 



Dr. Koyle quotes Dr. Bowring's description 

 of a lily, which that writer terms the lily of 

 Palestine, and heard called Lilia Syriaca, and 

 which grew in great profusion about Galilee. 

 Yet our white lily is not likely to be the lily 

 of the field, or the lily of the Song of Solomon, 

 or the prophets of the older Scriptures. The 

 white lily is not known to exist as a wild 

 flower in Syria. None of the natives of Pales- 

 tine can give any account of its growing wild 

 there, but it is cultivated in pots, and regarded 

 as a rare exotic. The fields of Palestine are, 

 however, full of liliaceous plants, and Sir J. E. 

 Smith and Dr. ICitto both consider that a 

 species of amaryllis was intended, the golden 

 flowers of which are common in fields of Pa- 

 lestine, or the Levant. Dr. Bowring plainly 

 indicates the scarlet martagon lily, which was in 



