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the peasants call them, sprinkled over the 
green meadows, 
** Fluttering and dancing-in the breeze.” 
And to them attaches a legend which is 
familiar to every one. Varciss¢ they are, 
bearing down to us, on their golden flowers, 
that myth of the ancient time which teaches 
such a lesson to self-adorers. 
Narcissus was a beautiful youth, who, re- 
jecting all affection from others, pined with 
a vain love for his own image reflected in 
the brook, till he died, and was changed, by 
one of the very indulgent deities of Olympus, 
into this fluttering golden floweret. It is to 
this legend that Shelley alludes in his beau- 
tiful poem of the “ Sensitive Plant :”— 
‘* Narcissi, the fairest of them all, 
Who gaze on their eyes in the stream’s recess, 
Till they die of their own dear loveliness.” 
It is well made the floral synonym for 
“* Egotism.” 
Milton, in “ Comus,” refers to an ancient 
