oblong, about an inch and a half, or two inches long, clothed on 
both sides with small close pressed bristly hairs. Clusters many- 
flowered, forked, frequently with a solitary flower between the 
forks ; each general and partial stalk, as well as the calyx, are 
clothed with short, straight, simple, close pressed bristly hairs. 
Partial-stalks at first crowded into a dense revolute spike, which 
unrolls gradually, and after flowering is greatly elongated, the 
partial-stalks spreading almost horizontally as the seeds ripen, form- 
ing a loose straight cluster. Calyx bell-shaped at the base, limb 
divided about half way down into 5 broad, triangular, rather spread- 
ing segments. Corolla handsome, tube yellowish, cylindrical, 
shorter than the limb, which is of a beautiful sky blue, with a small 
white ray at the base of each segment ; the valves of the mouth are 
yellow. Style not quite so long as the tube, Stigma capitate. Seeds 
egg-shaped, compressed, blunt, blackish, polished, somewhat bor- 
dered. — The flower-buds, just before they open, are of a fine pink, 
but immediately after the flowers expand they change to blue J. 
The following lines, addressed to the Forget-me-not, were written 
by Mr. J. W. S latter §, of Oxford. 
Little flower, whose magic name 
Kindles up affection’s flame, 
Free from all the tricks of art, 
In the wayside traveller’s heart. 
Pleas’d thy radiant head I view. 
Crown’d with bright casrulean blue ; 
Fresh as when to beauty born, 
Blushing through the dews of morn ; 
Thee in other days 1 met, 
E’er my eyes, with sorrow wet. 
Gaz’d on human guilt and woe, 
Beauty then touched all below. 
Still the same, I love thee still. 
Tenant of the nameless rill, 
Like a thought that cannot stay, 
Gliding from the world away. 
Change since then has mark’d my lot, 
Much I’ve seen, and much forgot ; 
Still thy pale blue light appearing, 
Childhood’s earliest haunts endearing ; 
Though its hours like stars have set, 
Thee and these I ne’er forget. 
Oxford, Sept. 24, 1833. 
I This elegant and beautiful plant has, for many centuries, been considered as 
the emblem of friendship, in almost every country in Europe. The following 
tale will explain the origin of its name : — “ Two lovers, who were on the eve of 
being united, were loitering on the margin of a lake, on a fine summer evening, 
when the maiden espied an attractive cluster of the flowers of Myosotis palustris 
growing close to the water on the bank of an island at some distance from the 
shore. She expressed a wish to possess them, when her knight, in the true spirit 
of chivalry, plunged into the water, and swimming to the spot, cropped the 
wished-for plant ; but his strength was unable to fulfil the object of his achieve- 
ment, and feeling that he could not regain the shore, although very near it, he 
threw the flowers upon the bank, and casting a last affectionate look upon the 
object his soul held most dear, he cried, ‘ Forget-me-not !' and sunk to rise no 
more.”— See Mill’s History of Chivalry, v. i. p. 315. 
§ Mr. Scatter is the author of" Rural Pictures,” a small volume of chaste 
and elegant Poems. 
