PRIMROSE . 
( Youth.) 
The primrose I will pu’, the firstling of the year.”—B urns. 
HE Primrose, emblematical of youth, has received 
innumerable deservedly warm encomiums from 
our poets, but none sweeter than those popular 
lines of Carew :— 
“ Ask me why I send you here 
This firstling of the infant year ; 
Ask me why I send to you 
This primrose all bepearled with dew ; 
I straight will whisper in your ears 
The sweets of love are washed with tears. 
“ Ask me why this flower doth show 
So yellow, green, and sickly too ; 
Ask me why the stalk is weak 
And bending, yet it doth not break ; 
I must tell you, these discover 
What doubts and fears are in a lover.” 
Shakspeare, whose floral symbolism was perfect, intro¬ 
duces this delicate blossom into his pathetic drama of 
“ Cymbeline,” as typical of the youthful dead: 
“ With fairest flowers, 
Whilst Summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele, 
I’ll sweeten thy sad grave : thou shalt not lack 
The flower that’s like thy face, pale primrose.” 
Again, in the “ Winter’s Tale,” the grand dramatist 
