Lilacs and Privets 



soul of memory." * And hence the shrub has become 

 associated with the affections and memories of youth, 

 so that "the lilacs where the robin built" are inevitably 

 part of the poet's remembrance of "the house where I 

 was born." Since memories of the past are necessarily 

 associated with death in some form or another, it seems 

 natural that the Lilac should have become linked with 

 the thought of death with death specially in the 

 spring-time ; perhaps, too, the purples and whites of 

 the blossoms suggest mourning. So Walt Whitman, 

 mourning the passing of President Lincoln in the 

 spring-time said, 



"Ever returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring 

 Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star in the west, 

 And thought of him I love." 



And when he further desired to chant "a song for you 

 O sane and sacred death," he wrote, 



" Here coffin that slowly passes, 

 I give you my sprig of Lilac. 



O death, I cover you with roses and early lilies, 

 But mostly and now the lilac that blooms the first; 

 Copious I break, I break the sprigs from the bushes. 

 With loaded arms I come, pouring for you, 

 For you and the coffins, all of you, O death." 



There is the same idea underlying the rosemary, a 

 scent that links up memories of the past, and hence 

 association of death with life. 



* " A Garden of Pleasure." E. V. B. 

 103 



