

THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
Throw hither all your quaint enamell’d eyes, 
That on the green turf suck the honied 
showers, 
And purple all the ground with vernal 
flowers ; 
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, 
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine, 
The white pink, and the pansy freak’d with jet, 
The glowing violet, 
The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears: 
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed, 
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, 
To strow the laureate hearse where Lycid lies.” 
It has been objected that Milton’s bouquet 
was formed of flowers that bloom at different 
seasons ; but we pardon the fault, if such 
it be, in consideration of the beauty of the 
passage, even as we forgive the artist who, 
for effect of colour or sentiment, sometimes 
in like manner oversteps the floral boundary 
of possibility. 
Shakspeare, the High Priest of Nature, 
has been truer to her laws in his most poetic 
grouping of flowers, and has formed HIS 
garland, of blossomg that breathe the air at 
the same period. 

