LILIUM CANDIDUM. THE WHITE LILY. 
Class VI. HEXANDRIA.— Order I. MONOGYNIA. 
Natural Order, LILIACE^E. THE LILY TRIBE. 
Professor Lindley describes this tribe as follows 
Essential Character. — Calyx and corolla confounded, coloured, regular, occasionally cohering in a 
tube. Stamens 6, inserted into the sepals and petals. Ovary superior, 3-celled, many-seeded; style 1 ; 
stigma simple, or 3-lobed. Fruit dry, capsular, 3-celled, many-seeded, with a loculicidal dehiscence. Seeds 
flat, packed one upon another in 1 or 2 rows, with a spongy, dilated, often winged integument; embryo with 
the same direction as the seed, in the axis of fleshy albumen. — Bulbs scaly, or stems arborescent. Leaves 
with parallel veins, either lanceolate or cordate. Flowers large. 
Affinities. Distinguishable from Asphodeleee by their higher degree of developement, and by the 
texture of the coat of their seeds. Various degrees of cohesion between their sepals and petals occur, so 
that we have tubular perianths and revolute ones even in the same genus (Lilium.) Hence Mr. Brown’s 
Hemerocallidese, which he states differ from Liliaceae in almost nothing but their tubular perianth, cannot 
be retained. Decandolle refers Erythonium to Asphodelem in the Botanicon Gallicum; in the Flore Fran- 
qaise he placed it in Melanthacese ; but it surely ought to be stationed here. 
Lily [Lilium, Xeipiov, rpivov,) probably derived from an Eastern word signifying a flower, or, as 
some affirm, from the Celtic Li, (whence the Gallic Lis,) whiteness or shining, is a name that has been 
given to many very different plants; such as the water-lily (Nymph sea), the superb lilies, now commonly 
so called, and others; even to the Lilach (Syringa,) the original Persian name for which has been anglicised 
without alteration. 
The application of this term has been very variously extended and restrained; for the word lily has 
been used both as a general and an individual name. It was thus employed by the ancients, and also, 
among the moderns, both by Linnseus and Jussieu. 
Solomon uses lily (Shushan) in a collective sense, and likewise distinguishes, among lilies, the Shu- 
shan of the valley ; and “a Greater than Solomon,” when he gave us the affectionate command to "consider 
the lilies of the field,” seems, while adopting popular language, evidently to have had a similar comprehen- 
sive meaning, which may be shewn, both from the context and from modern phyto-geographical researches. 
Historical references, and a knowledge of local peculiarities, can alone fully develop the impressive beauty 
of this, as well as of many other passages in ancient records. Thus, for example, it is well known that fuel 
is so scarce in the Holy Land, and in many parts of the East, that the inhabitants regard large trees with 
especial reverence, and are obliged to use by turns every kind of combustible matter, such as the withered 
stalks of herbs and flowers, the tendrils of the vine, and small branches of rosemary, and other plants, to 
heat their baths and ovens. Allusion to this custom is easily recognized in this passage, and adds much 
natural force to Christ’s concluding remark : “ If God so clothe the grass of the field, which to-day is, and 
to-morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith ?” The grass of the 
field here evidently includes the lilies, of which the Saviour had just been speaking, and by consequence 
such herbaceous plants in general; and in such an extensive sense both words are not unfrequently to be 
taken. This will appear still further evident from the observation of Sir James E. Smith, who, when en- 
deavouring to identify these lilies, which he considers not to have been lilies but amary Hides, says, "It is 
natural to presume, the divine Teacher, according to his usual custom, called the attention of his hearers to 
some object at hand, and, as the fields of the Levant are over-run with the Amaryllis lutea, whose golden 
liliaceous flowers afford in autumn one of the most brilliant and gorgeous sights in nature, the expression of 
f Solomon in all his glory not being arrayed like one of these,’ is peculiarly appropriate. I consider the 
feeling,” he continues, " with which this was expressed as the highest honour ever done to the study of 
plants ; and, if my botanical conjecture be correct, we learn a chronological fact respecting the season of the 
