THE DAISY. 
19 
foot, Marigold, Groundsel, Ragwort, Elecampane, the Chrysan- 
themum, and our special favourite, the common Daisy, of which 
we will now proceed to speak. 
From the foregoing remarks on the order Composites 
generally, the family relationship of our little friend will he 
pretty well established. Nowhere has the structure and- general 
appearance of the daisy been described so pleasantly as in some 
letters on the elements of botany, by the celebrated philosopher 
and poet, Rousseau, but he does not appear to have thought of 
g-oing further into the subject than would be suggested by 
merely external observation. We have at this day so many 
appliances at hand to assist our investigations, that if we are 
disposed to make use of them, we shall find in our little plant 
much that is most interesting, hitherto undescribed. Having- 
determined to study the daisy in all its parts, no subject can be 
obtained with less difficulty. Throughout Great Britain, we 
find its tiny bright flowers spi-inging- up on every “ lawn and 
grassy plot,” by waysides, on mountain- slopes ; and in almost 
every country in Europe may we find 
“ These pearled Arcturi of the earth, 
The constellated flowers that never set.” 
In the extreme north of Europe, however, and in America, it 
is not common, and is there treasured as a garden flower. 
Though not exclusively a British plant, yet so closely is the 
daisy associated with the eai-liest recollections of every native of 
the British isles, that we can scarcely wonder that it is especially 
dear to the wanderer from home in distant lands, and that it 
brings back recollections of rural scenes such as cannot be met 
with elsewhere. There is an old Celtic belief that each new- 
born babe taken from earth became a spirit which scattered 
down on the land it had left some new kmd of flower to cheer 
its bereaved parents ; the tale is thus told : — “ The virgins of 
Morven, to soothe the grief of Malvina, who had lost her infant 
son, sung to her — f W e have seen, oh Malvina ! we have seen 
the infant you regret, reclining on a fight mist ; it approached 
us, and shed on our fields a harvest of new flowers. Look, oh 
Malvina ! among these flowers we distinguish one with a golden 
disk, surrounded by silver leaves; a sweet tinge of crimson 
adorns its delicate rays ; waved by a gentle wind, we might call 
it a little infant playing in a green meadow ; and the flower of 
thy bosom has given a new flower to the hills of Cromla.-’ 
Since that day the daughters of Morven have consecrated the 
daisy to infancy. It is called the flower of innocence, — the 
flower of the new-born.” 
Leaving the regions of fancy and poetry, which, however 
tempting and delightful if indulged in without some previous 
c 2 
