98 OUTDOOR STUDIES 
and second finger affectionately around it, press 
the extended forefinger firmly to the stem 
below, and with one steady pull you will secure 
a long and delicate stalk, fit to twine around 
the graceful head of your beloved, as the Hin- 
doo goddess of beauty encircled with a Lotus 
the brow of Rama. 
Consider the lilies. AJ] over our rural water- 
courses, at midsummer, float these cups of 
snow. They are nature’s symbols of coolness. 
They suggest to us the white garments of their 
Oriental worshippers. They come with the 
white roses, and prepare the way for the white 
lilies of the garden. The white doe of Ryl- 
stone and Andrew Marvell’s fawn might fitly 
bathe amid their beauties. Yonder steep bank 
slopes down to the lakeside, one solid mass of 
pale pink laurel, but, once upon the water, a 
purer tint prevails. The pink fades into a 
lingering flush, and the white creature floats 
peerless, set in green without and gold within. 
That bright circle of stamens is the very ring 
with which Doges once wedded the Adriatic ; 
Venice has lost it, but it dropped into the 
water-lily’s bosom, and there it rests forever. 
So perfect in form, so redundant in beauty, so 
delicate, so spotless, so fragrant, — what pre- 
sumptous lover ever dared, in his most enam- 
oured hour, to liken his mistress to a water- 
