£be Crocus's Soliloquy 



OWN in my solitude under the snow, 

 Where nothing cheering can reach me ; 

 Here, without light to see how to grow, 

 I'll trust to nature to teach me. 



i 



I will not despair, nor be idle, nor frown, 



Locked in so gloomy a dwelling ; 

 My leaves shall run up, and my roots shall run down, 



While the bud in my bosom is swelling. 



Soon as the frost will get out of my bed, 



From this cold dungeon to free me, 

 I will peer up with my little bright head, 



All will be joyful to see me. 



Then from my heart young buds diverge, 



As rays of the sun from their focus ; 

 I from the darkness of earth will emerge, 



A happy and beautiful Crocus ! 



Gaily array 'd in my yellow and green, 



When to their view I have risen, 

 Will they not wonder how one so serene, 



Came from so dismal a prison 1 



Many perhaps, from so simple a flower, 



This little lesson may borrow ; 

 Patient to-day, through its gloomiest hour, 



We come out the brighter to-morrow. 



" The Saturday Magazine" February \ 1836. 



* I came across these lines in an old volume of The Saturday Magazine of 1836. I was 

 ily three years old then, but since I have always had a few Crocuses growing in my lawn. 



C. J. FOX, Delaware. 



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