NARCISSUS ANGUSTIFOLIUS.— NARROW-LEAVED NARCISSUS. 
Class VI. HEXANDRIA.— Order I. MONOGYNIA. 
Natural Order, AMARYLLIDiE. THE NARCISSUS TRIBE. 
Flowers solitary, cup of the nectary very short, membranous and notched at the edge, leaves bluntly 
keeled, with reflected edges. Flower pure white ; the nectary edged with crimson ; fragrant. Perennial ; 
flowers in May ; grows in dry open fields in England. 
Under the name of Poeticus three different species of Narcissus, appearing perfectly distinct, though 
familiar in many respects, and regarded as such by the old botanists, viz. : 
The first of these, the one here figured, is evidently the poeticus of Linnaeus, judging by the authors 
to whom he refers in the third edition of his Spec. PI. which are indeed few in number, and confined 
chiefly to Baub. Pin. and Dodonmis ; of the second and third he takes no notice. 
The two former ones of these have the greatest affinity, inasmuch as they both produce for the most 
part only one flower, of a white colour, having a very short nectary, edged with red ; to both of these 
Linnaeus’s specific description is equally applicable, as well as the trivial name of poeticus, given them in- 
discriminately by several of the old botanists, some regarding the first, some the second, as the plant men- 
tioned by Theocritus, Virgil, and Ovid ; unfortunately both of them are found to grow in the same meadows, 
and have the same obvious appearances, it is therefore utterly impossible to say which of the two was the 
Narcissus of the poets ; if we have the greatest difficulty in ascertaining what the plants were of the botanists 
of those times, how are we to discover what the poets meant, who with very few exceptions have been un- 
pardonably inattentive to the appearances of nature. The term Poeticus is equally suitable to both. 
Ovid, in his Metamorphoses, tells us of the fate of the lovely Narcissus. A thousand nymphs loved 
the handsome youth, but suffered the pangs of unrequited love. Viewing himself in the crystal fount he 
became enamoured of his own image. 
For as his own bright image he surveyed, 
He fell in love with the fantastic shade ; 
And o'er the fair resemblance hung unmoved, 
Nor knew, fond youth ! it was himself he loved. — Ovid. 
In consequence of this error he slighted the love of Echo, who witnessed his fruitless vows to the de- 
ceitful image. Addison thus translates the passage : — 
Then on the wholesome earth he gasping lies, 
Till death shuts up those self-admiring eyes. 
To the cold shades his flitting ghost retires, 
And in the Stygian waves itself admires. 
She saw him in his present misery 
Whom, spite of all her wrongs, she grieved to see ; 
She answered sadly to the lover’s moan, 
Sighed back his sighs, and groaned to every groan ; 
“ Ah, youth! beloved in vain,” Narcissus cries — 
“ Ah, youth ! beloved in vain,’’ the Nymph replies. 
For him the Naiads and Dryads mourn, 
Whom the sad Echo answers in her turn ! 
And now the sister-nymphs prepare his urn; 
When looking for his corpse, they only found 
A rising stalk with yellow blossoms crowned. 
“ Farewell,” says he ; the parting sound scarce fell 
From his faint lips, but she replied, “ Farewell.” 
The cup in the centre of the flower is supposed to contain the tears of Narcissus, to which Milton 
alludes ; and Virgil in the following, where he is speaking of the occupations of the bees : — 
Pars intra septa domorum 
Narcissi lacrymam, et lentum de cortice gluten, 
Prima favis ponunt fundamina, deinde tenaces 
Suspeudunt ceras.” Virgil, Georgic 4. 
“ Some within the house lay tears of daffodils, and tough glue from the barks of trees, for the foundations of the combs, and then 
suspend the tenacious wax.” — Martin’s Translation. 
Thomson celebrates the sweetness of the Narcissus : 
“ No gradual bloom is wanting; from the bud, 
First-born of Spring to Summer’s musky tribes ; 
N or hyacinths, of purest virgin white, 
Low bent, and blushing inward ; nor jonquils, 
Of potent fragrance; nor Narcissus fair, 
As o’er the fabled fountain hanging still.” 
Thomson’s Spring. 
Narcissus, drooping on his rill, 
Keeps his odorous beauty still.”* 
Translation from Milton. 
