
The Poetry of Flowers. 


And may not e’en a simple flower 
Proclaim His glorious praise, 
Whose fiat only had the power 
Its form from earth to raise? 
Then freely let thy blossom ope 
Its beauties—to recall 
A scene which bids the humble hope 
In Him who died for all! 
a 
THE LILY OF THE VALLEY. 
BY BISHOP MANT. 
FAIR flower, that, lapt in lowly glade, 
Dost hide beneath the greenwood shade, 
‘Than whom the vernal gale 
None fairer wakes, on bank or spray, 
Our England's Lily of the May, 
Our Lily of the Vale! 
Art thou that ‘‘ Lily of the field,” 
Which, when the Saviour sought to shield 
The heart from blank despair, 
He showed to our mistrustful kind, 
An emblem of the thoughtful mind, 
Of God’s paternal care? 
Not this, I trow ; for brighter shine 
To the warm skies of Palestine 
Those children of the East : 
There, when mild autumn’s early rain 
Descends on parched Esdrela’s plain 
And Tabor's oak-girt crest, 
K 
