Polyanthus. 
225 
a singular propensity for meat, and that a good part of its 
bloom is actually owing, like an alderman’s, to this consumption 
of flesh. Juicy pieces of meat are placed about the root, so 
that it may in some measure be said to live on blood. This 
undoubtedly lessens its charms in some eyes—its florid aspect 
somehow becomes unnatural; and the “shining meal,” with 
which Thomson says it is “enriched,” being no longer asso¬ 
ciated with vegetation, makes it look like a baker covered 
with flour, and just come out from a dinner in his hot oven. 
Keats evidently describes either the polyanthus or auricula in 
this passage of “ Endymion : ” 
“ Oft have I brought thee flowers, on their stalks set 
Like vestal primroses, but dark velvet 
Edges them round, and they have golden pits.” 
IS 
