22 DROPS FROM FLORA’S CUP. 
THE WINTER NOSEGAY. 
MRS. SIGOURNEY. 
Flowers, fresh flowers, with your fragrance free, 
Have you come in your queenly robes to me ? 
Me have you sought, from your fair retreat, 
With your greeting lips and your dewy feet, 
And the heavenward glance of your radiant eye, 
Like angel-guests from a purer sky ? 
But where did ye hide when the frost comes near, 
And your manygisters were pale with fear? 
Where did ye hide, with a cheek as bright 
As gleamed amid Eden’s vales of light, 
Ere the wiles of the Tempter its bliss had shamed, 
Or the terrible sword o’er the gateway flamed? 
Flowers — sweet flowers —with your words of 
cheer, 
Thanks to the friend who hath brought you here; 
For this, may her blossoms of varied dye, 
Be the earliest born 'neath the vernal sky; 
And she be led by thy whispered lore, 
To the love of that land where they fade no more. 
1 No more, rich rose, on thy heaving breast, 
The honey-bee fold his wings to rest! ’ 
