*54 
SHAKESPEARE’S GARDEN 
a class of flowers of singular beauty, which have 
become great garden favourites in the last quarter of 
a century. Its name, daffodil, varied into daffadown¬ 
dilly, daffodilly, came from a confusion of asphodel, 
affodilly, with another plant, sapharoun-lily—at least, 
so Prior says. 
The legend of Narcissus and his shadowy love is 
told in Ovid (‘‘Met., 57 Book IV., vi.-vii.), where we 
learn that Juno, to punish Echo, who has detained 
her with stories while Jupiter’s mistresses escape, 
allows her to fall in love with Narcissus, and to be 
slighted by him in return. One of the many 
nymphs who, like Echo, had been thus despised, 
prayed to Rhamnusia ( i.e ., Nemesis), the goddess of 
Retribution, thus : “ Though he should love, let him 
not enjoy what he loves.” This seeming to Rham¬ 
nusia reasonable, the prayer was granted, and 
Narcissus fell in love with his shadow, reflected in a 
spring, when he pined away. Ovid ends : “ And now 
they were preparing the funeral pile, and the shaken 
torches, and the bier. The body was nowhere to be 
found. Instead of his body they found a yellow 
flower, with white leaves encompassing the middle.” 
It appears the flower was known to the ancients, 
and its praises sung by the poets of Greece and 
Italy. 
Shakespeare alludes to it in the pretty song in the 
Winter s Tale , IV. iii. 1, given as our heading : 
When daffodils begin to peer, 
With heigh ! the doxy over the dale, 
Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year ; 
For the red blood reigns in the winter’s pale. 
And, again, in the same, IV. iv. 118 : 
Daffodils, 
That come before the swallow dares, and take 
The winds of March with beauty. 
