248 THE COMPLETE SPORTSMAN 



have but recently expressed my respect in the 

 material form of a five-shilling donation towards 

 that excellent scheme whereby it is proposed 

 to keep his memory green by pulling down 

 St. George's Hospital and raising in its place 

 a Repertoire Theatre for the production of 

 plays which the public does not want to see. 

 Nevertheless, I cannot help feeling that the 

 expenditure of a little earnest thought would 

 have saved the poet from allowing one of his 

 most lovable characters thus idly to under- 

 estimate the importance of appropriate nomen- 

 clature. 



Let us, however, take the Bard at his word 

 and try for a moment to imagine what would 

 happen if flowers were to be rechristened, if the 

 rose could exchange her name for that of, say, 

 her kinsman the scabious or Egyptian rose, of 

 the starry stinkwort of the hedgerow, or the 

 saxifrage of the rock-garden. Would she con- 

 tinue to smell as sweet as ever in the public 

 nostrils, do you think ? I doubt it. 



Suppose, for instance, that some impassioned 

 lover, infected with Shakespeare's indifference 

 to the value of names, were to address to his 

 betrothed a valentine couched in the following 

 terms : 



" My love is like a pink, pink scabious. 

 That sweetly springs in June !" 



