NEWS OF SPRING 



in only by favour of a lie, as a traitor, a spy, a livid deserter. 

 It is a forsworn yellow, cowardly steeped in the trembling 

 azure of a moonbeam. It is still of the night and false, like 

 the opal depths of the sea; it shows itself only in shifting 

 patches at the tip of the petals ; it is elusive and anxious, frail 

 and deceptive, but undeniable. It has made its entrance, it 

 exist, it asserts itself; it will be daily more fixed and more 

 decided; and, through the breach which it has contrived in 

 the citadels of light, all the joys and all the splendours of the 

 banned prism will hurl themselves into the virgin domain, 

 there to prepare unwonted feasts for our eyes. This is 

 great tidings and a memorable conquest in the land of flowers. 



5 

 We must not think that it is childish thus to interest one's 

 self in the capricious forms, the unwritten shades of a flower 

 that bears no fruit; nor must we treat those who seek to make 

 it more beautiful or more strange as La Bruyere once treated 

 the lover of the tulip or the plum. Do you remember the 

 charming page? 



"The lover of flowers has a garden in the suburbs, where 

 he spends all his time from sunrise to sunset. You see him 



[i66] 



