The Lily. 129 



flowers as odoriferous as these flowers are in Spain at their usual 

 season. This was cut, we are told, and placed upon the great 

 altar of the church of St. Juste, on the borders of Castile. In 

 England it was among the earliest exotics that graced the gar- 

 dens, and probably one of the plants gained from Palestine, by- 

 means of the early crusaders. It appears to have been a great 

 favorite with the ancient Greeks ; and in the wedding ceremo- 

 nies of the modern ones, the priest is supplied with two chaplets 

 of Lilies and ears of corn, which he places on the heads of the 

 bride and bridegroom, as emblems of purity and abundance. 

 The Romans regarded it with equal admiration ; it was planted 

 by them in baskets. Pliny mentions it as next to the rose in 

 beauty, and says, the root, when dry, was frequently steeped in 

 purple wine, in order to produce purple flowers ; the success of 

 which plan we are not aware of. The white Lily is of so easy 

 a cultivation that it will prosper in almost any soil or situation ; 

 and as it readily increases by offsets from the parent bulb, it is 

 become a common inmate in most cottage gardens, and held in 

 less esteem than many inferior flowers which the difficulty of 

 propagation renders rare, and consequently valuable. The off- 

 sets should be removed from the old bulb every third year, 

 and the month of August is the proper season for transplanting 

 them. They should be covered with about five inches of earth, 

 but on no account removed in the spring of the year, as this 

 is found to check their flowering for several years. As this 

 species sends up a stem from three to four feet in height, it is 

 better calculated to plant amongst shrubs than in the small quar- 

 ters of the flower garden ; and when mixed with clumps of roses, 

 the effect is as agreeable to the eye as appropriate to the emble- 

 matic combination of Purity and Beauty. It gives a great relief 

 and cheerfulness to heavy clumps of evergreens, and is a charm- 

 ing accompaniment to borders of woods or wilderness scenery. 

 It continues in flower from the middle of June to the middle of 

 August, and as its fragrance is of an agreeable kind in the open 

 air, no garden should be without this noble and highly ornamen- 

 tal flower. 



The Lily belongs to the class Hexandria, order Monogynia, 

 and is the type of the natural order Liliaceae. The generic 

 name is of obscure origin, some deriving it from the Greek, 

 meaning smooth and handsome. Its characters are: corolla 



