1 66 ?Ti)e <Kar&en's Stotg. 



not be overlooked. I may add, on the other 

 hand, if you smell of a lily you are liable to be 

 stained by its pollen ; and if you pluck a rose, 

 there lurks the hidden thorn. Perhaps the lily 

 and the rose, or the rose and the lily, furnish a 

 case in point where comparisons are odious, and 

 each one may better decide for himself which is 

 the superior flower. 



I begin with the lily, therefore, because it 

 comes first alphabetically, and is first to appear. 

 Whispered the white lily to me : I am the em- 

 blem of purity, the type of saintliness ; at the 

 altar and at the tomb I bring joy and consola- 

 tion ; in the garden I am sweet beyond all my 

 companions, and with my whiteness none can 

 compare ; I am sweet, I am chaste, I am beloved 

 by all. Do you know my origin ? " Jupiter 

 wished to make his boy Hercules (born of a 

 mortal) one of the gods: so he snatched him 

 from the bosom of his earthly mother, Alcmena, 

 and bore him to the breast of the god-like Juno. 

 The milk is spilled from the full-mouthed boy as 

 he traverses the sky (making the Milky Way), 

 and what drops below stars and clouds and 

 touches earth, stains the ground with lilies." 



So extensive and beautiful is the genus 

 Lz'lzum, so varied in form, color, and periods of 

 blossoming, that, like the daffodil, a garden might 



