222 FLORA DOMESTICA. 



the fair countenances of these fair Chiotes, are such as 

 Milton describes by * hyacin thine locks' crisped and curled 

 like the blossoms of that flower V 



Collins has the same simile in his Ode to Liberty : 



" The youths whose locks divinely spreading, 

 Like vernal hyacinths in sullen hue." 



It occurs again in Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia : 



" It was the excellently fair Queen Helen, whose jacinth hair, curled 

 by nature, but intercurled by art, like a fine brook through golden 

 sands, had a rope of fair pearl, which now hiding, now hidden by the 

 hair, did, as it were, play at fast and loose each with other, mutually 

 giving and receiving richness." 



The Persian poet, Hafiz, also compares the dark Hya- 

 cinth to the locks of his mistress [*. Lord Byron makes the 

 same comparison, as also does Sir W. Jones repeatedly. 

 Lord Byron says the idea is common to the Eastern as well 

 as to the Grecian poets. 



Allusions to the letters #z, supposed to be seen upon the 

 ancient Hyacinth, are made by many of the poets. It re- 

 quires but little assistance from the imagination to read 

 them on the Martagon Lily. 



" Del languido giacinto, che nel grembo 

 Porta dipinto il suo dolore araaro." 



" The languid hyacinth, who wears 



His bitter sorrows painted on his bosom." 



Mr. Hunt, in his Calendar of Nature, after dwelling a 

 little upon the question, whether the Martagon Lily is the 

 true Hyacinth, quotes a passage from Moschus, which he 

 thus renders in English : 



" Now tell your story, hyacinth ; and show 

 Ai, aij the more amidst your sanguine woe." 



One of our modern poems, also, lias an allusion to this 

 circumstance : 



* Dallaway's Constantinople, p. 283. 

 t See the Notes to Moore's Lalla Rookh. 



