88 
LANGUAGE AND 
thing which, for want of a better name, we 
agree to call Poetry, the Eglantine should indeed 
find favor with the votaries of that gentle art; 
and ; might we reckon the value of their esteem 
for it by the number of sweet things they have 
said about it, we could put a high price upon its 
beauties. What wooer of the muses has ne¬ 
glected to pay his passing tribute to the sweet¬ 
leaved eglantine?—‘‘therain-scented eglantine;” 
the sweet, the fresh, the fair,”—the eglantine 
to which the sun himself pays homage, by 
‘ counting his dewy rosary,” on it every morning. 
ihe honeysuckle, or woodbine, symbolic of 
generous and devoted affection , is frequently mis¬ 
taken even by the poets themselves—to their 
shame be it said—for the eglantine, or sweet- 
biiar, as it is sometimes called: even Milton 
appears to fall into this error when he speaks 
of “ the twisted eglantine.” Where the English 
Ilomer nods, it is not to be Avondered at if lesser 
mortals, headed by Scott, the Wizard of the 
North, prove less Avakeful ; and so we have to 
turn to Shakspeare, the righter of all wrongs, to 
put us right aneAV. He tells us : 
“ I know a bank whereon the wild thyme bloAvs, 
Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows; 
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine, 
With sweet musk roses, and with eglantine.” 
