HOW THE ROSE BECAME RED. 
67 
* Lady, shall I tell thee where 
Nature seems most blest and fair. 
Far above all climes beside ?— 
’T is where those we love abide, 
And that little spot is best 
Which the loved one’s foot hath pressed. 
' ‘Though it be a fairy space. 
Wide and spreading is the place; 
Though’t were but a barren mound, 
’T would become enchanted ground. 
‘With thee yon sandy waste would seem 
The margin of Al-Cawthar’s stream ; 
And thou canst make a dungeon’s gloom, 
A bower, where new-born roses bloom.’ ” 
Lily of the Valley! what a spring sound there 
is in its very name! How delicate it is, both in 
form and fragrance ; resting its white, fairy-like bells 
upon a deep background of green, like a little child 
which has fallen asleep with its careless arms 
extended upon the emerald April grass. Pleasant 
visions does it recall before mine eyes of other 
days—of springs which have long since passed 
away : of old woods just putting forth their summer 
leaves,— dingle, and dell, and glen, and copse, and 
many other sweet woodland spots, amid which we 
rambled for hours together, that were strewn every¬ 
where full “ ankle-deep with Lilies of the Valley.” 
Places where the callow throstles first lisped, and 
the golden-beaked blackbird sang,—where the little 
wren went hopping from spray to spray, and the 
yellow linnet warbled forth her song, concealed by 
