LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
LAMENT OF MARY, QUEEN 
OF SCOTS, 
On the Approach of Spring. 
Now Nature hangs her mantle green 
On every blooming tree, 
And spreads her sheets c’ daisies white 
Out o er the grassy lea; 
Now Phoebus cheers the crystal streams, 
And glads the a/ure skies ; 
But nought can glad the weary wight 
That fast in durance lies, 
Now lav’rocks wake the merry morn, 
Aloft on dewy wing ; 
The merle, in his noontide bow’r, 
Makes woodland echoes ring ; 
The mavis mild wi’ many a note, 
Sings drowsy day to rest : 
In love and freedom they rejoice, 
Wi’ care nor thrall opprest. 
Now blooms the lily by the bank, 
The primrose down the brae ; 
The hawthorn’s budding in the glen, 
And milk-white is the slae ; 
The meanest hind in fair Scotland 
May rove their sweets amang ; 
But I, the Queen of a’ Scotland, 
Maun lie in prison strang. 
I was the Queen o’ bonnie France, 
Where happy I hae been ; 
Fu' lightly rase I in the morn, 
As blythe lay down at e en ; 
And I'm the sov’reign of Scotland, 
And mony a traitor there ; 
Yet here I lie in foreign lands, 
And never ending care. 
But as for thee, thou false woman, 
My sister and my fae. 
Grim vengeance, yet, shall whet a sword 
That thro' thy soul shall gae : 
The weeping blood in woman's breast 
Was never known to thee; 
Nor th’ balm that draps on wounds of woe 
Frae woman’s pitying e’e. 
My son ! my son ! may kinder stars 
Upon thy fortune shine ; 
And may those pleasures gild thy reign, 
That ne’er wad blink on mine ! 
God keep thee frae thy mother’s faes, 
Or turn their hearts to thee : 
And where thou meet’st thy mother’s friend, 
Remember him for me! 
Oh ! soon, to me, may summer-suns 
Nae mair light up the morn ! 
Nae mair, to me, the autumn winds 
Wave o’er the yellow corn! 
And in the narrow house o’ death 
Let winter round me rave ; 
And the next flow’rs that deck the spring, 
Bloom on my peaceful grave ! 
Burns. 
67 
