BEAUTY. 
53 
midst of a light and lively dance, overthrew, 
with a stroke of his wing, a cup of nectar; 
which precious liquor, falling on the rose, 
embalmed it with that delightful fragrance 
which it still retains. 
They tell us that love in his fairy bower 
Had two blush roses of birth divine ; 
He sprinkled the one with a rainbow’s shower, 
But bathed the other with mantling wine. 
Soon did the buds. 
That drank of the floods 
Distill’d by the rainbow, decline and fade ; 
While those which the tide 
Of ruby had dyed 
All blush’d into beauty, like thee, sweet maid! 
MOORE. 
The rose is said to have heen originally 
white. Catullus has accounted for its change 
of colour in the following beautiful lines : — 
While the enamoured queen of joy 
Flies to protect her lovely boy, 
On whom the jealous war-god rushes; 
She treads upon a thorned rose, 
And while the wound with crimson flows, 
The snowy floweret feels her blood, and blushes ! 
