

THE STEM. 91 



every little rose of it has a green darkness in the centre not 

 even a pretty green, but a faded, yellowish, glutinous, un- 

 accomplished green ; and round that, all over the surface of 

 the blossom, whose shell-like petals are themselves deep sunk, 

 with grey shadows in the hollows of them all above this al- 

 ready subdued brightness, are strewn the dark points of the 

 dead stamens manifest more and more, the longer one looks, 

 as a kind of grey sand, sprinkled without sparing over what 

 looked at first unspotted light. And in all the ways of it the 

 lovely thing is more like the spring frock of some prudent lit- 

 tle maid of fourteen, than a flower ; frock with some little 

 spotty pattern on it to keep it from showing an unintended 

 and inadvertent spot, if Fate should ever inflict snch a thing ! 

 Undeveloped, thinks Mr. Darwin, the poor short-coming, 

 ill-blanched thorn blossom going to be a Eose, some day 

 soon ; and, what next? who knows ? perhaps a Pseony ! 



3. Then this next branch, in dawn and delight of youth, set 

 with opening clusters of yet numerable blossom, four, and 

 five, and seven, edged, and islanded, and ended, by the sharp 

 leaves of freshest green, deepened under the flowers, and stud- 

 ded round with bosses, better than pearl beads of St. Agnes' 

 rosary, folded over and over, with the edges of their little 

 leaves pouting, as the very softest waves do on flat sand where 

 one meets another; then opening just enough to show the 

 violet colour within which yet isn't violet colour, nor even 

 " ineno che le rose," but a different colour from every other 

 lilac that one ever saw ; faint and faded even before it sees 

 light, as the filmy cup opens over the depth of it, then broken 

 into purple motes of tired bloom, fading into darkness, as the 

 cup extends into the perfect rose. 



This, with all its sweet change that one would so fain stay, and 

 soft effulgence of bud into softly falling flower, one has watched 

 how often ; but always with the feeling that the blossoms 

 are thrown over the green depth like white clouds never with 

 any idea of so much as asking what holds the clouds there. 

 Have each of the innumerable blossoms a separate stalk ? and, 

 if so, how is it that one never thinks of the stalk, as one does 

 with currants? 



