300 
BRITISH WILD FLOWERS. 
been found wild in Great Britain, and that is not- a true native. The plant takes its English name from the 
flowers smelling like starch, and they appear in May. Muscari alludes to the musk-like smell of some of the 
exotic species. 
GENUS VII. 
THE HYACINTH. (Hyacinthus, Lin.) 
Lin. Syst. IlEXANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
Generic Character. —Periauthium six-cleft, tubular ; segments spreading at the apex. Stamens inserted about the middle of the perianthium 
Capsule obtusely three-cornered. Cells many-seeded. ( Lindley .) 
Description, &c. —The common Harebells, or Wild Hyacinth (H. nonscriptus , Lin.), is the only British 
species of the genus, but it is common on hedge-banks and in thickets in every part of Great Britain. 
GENUS VIII. 
THE CONVALLARIA. (Convallaria, Lin.) 
Lin. Syst. HEXANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
Generic Character. —Sepals and petals united in a perianthium, which is either globose or cylindrical, and six-toothed. Stamens six. 
Berry round, before maturity spotted, three-celled, with one-seeded cells. ( Lindley .) 
Description, &c. —This genus was formerly placed in the natural order Smilicinea , but Dr. Lindley places 
it with the Hyacinth and other well-known bulbs in Asphodelem. The name of the genus is derived from 
Convallis, a valley, in allusion to the situation in which the species are generally found. 
1.—THE LILY OF THE VALLEY. iConvallaria majalis, Lin.) 
Engravings. —Eng. Bot., t. 1035 ; 2nd ed., t. 491 ; and our fig. \ cal. Cluster simple. Flowers drooping, cup-shaped, with rather 
2, in PI. 60. distinct segments. {Smith.) 
Specific Character. —Flower-stalk radical, naked, semi-cylindri- I 
Description, &c. —This beautiful and delightfully fragrant flower is common in woods in almost every 
part of Great Britain, though it is most abundant in rocky situations, and it seldom produces its large crimson 
berries in any other places. It however generally spreads rapidly, from its creeping roots, and it flowers in a 
wild state, in May. The following pretty lines, addressed to this flower, were written, I believe, by a young 
surgeon residing at Godaiming, but they appeared anonymously in the Field Naturalists’ Magazine , for 1833. 
“Fair flower that, lapped in lowly glade, 
Dost hide beneath the green-wood shade 
Than whom the vernal gale 
None fairer wakes on bank or spray ; 
Our England’s Lily of the May, 
Our Lily of the vale. 
“ Art thou that ‘ Lily of the field ’ 
Which, when the Saviour sought to shield 
The heart from black despair, 
He showed to our mistrustful kind, 
An emblem to the thoughtful mind. 
Of God’s paternal care ? 
‘ 1 AVhat though no care nor art be thine, 
The loom to ply, the thread to twine ? 
Yet, born to bloom and fade ; 
Thou too a lovelier robe arrays 
Than e’er, in Israel’s brightest days. 
Her wealthiest king arrayed ; 
“Of thy twin leaves th’ embowered screen, 
Which wraps thee in thy shroud of green, 
Thy Eden-breathing smell ; 
Thy arched and purple-vested stem, 
Whence pendant many a pearly gem, 
Displays a milk-white bell. 
