The winds forbid the flowers to flourish long, Which owe to winds their name in Grecian song. EUSDEN, FROM OVID.

FROM the soft wings of vernal breezes shed,
Anemonies, auriculas, enriched

With shining meal o'er all their velvet leaves,
And full ranunculas of glowing red.

THOMSON.

SEE yon Anemones their leaves unfold,
With rubies flaming, and with living gold!
In silken robes each hillock stands arrayed,
Be gay too soon the flowers of spring will fade.

Ah! crop the flowers of pleasure while they blow,
Fre winter hides them in a veil of snow.
Youth, like a thin Anemone, displays
His silken leaf, and in a morn decays.

SIR WM. JONES, FROM THE PERSIAN.

The Primrose.

Primula Vulgaris.

Class Pentandria.

Order Monogynia.

THIS lovely gem of " the darling of the year," appears amongst us in April. Its Swedish name is Maj-nycklar, or the Key of May, the first month of the almost instantaneous summer of high latitudes. The German Schliissel Blume, or key-flower, has the same signification; proclaiming, in the language of Solomon, that "the winter is now over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in the land."

"Now what is the flower, the æ first flower,
Springs either in moor or dale,

And what is the bird, the bonnie bonnie bird,
Sings on the evening gale?

"The Primrose is the æ first flower,
Springs either on moor or dale,

And the thristle-cock is the bonniest bird,
Sings on the evening gale."

OLD BALLAD. PROUD LADY MARGARET.

With fairest flowers,

Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele,
I'll sweeten thy sad grave: thou shalt not lack
The flower that's like thy face, pale Primrose;

nor

The azured hare-bell, like thy veins; no, nor The leaf of eglantine, whom not to slander, Out-sweetened not thy breath.

CYMBELINE.

SHE is the Rose, the glory of the day,
And mine the Primrose in the lowly shade.
Mine, ah! not mine; amisse I mine did say.
O that so faire a flowre so soone should fade,
And through untimely winter fall away.

SPENSER'S DAPHNAIDA.

Earine,

Who had her very being and her name
With the first knots and buddings of the Spring,
Born with the Primrose and the violet,
Or earliest roses blown; when Cupid smiled,
And Venus led the graces out to dance,
And all the flowers and scents in Nature's lap
Leaped out, and made their solemn conjuration,
To last but while she lived.

BEN JONSON. SAD SHEPHERD,

BRIDAL SONG OF THESEUS AND
HIPPOLITA.

ROSES, their sharp spines being gone,
Not royal in their smells alone,

But in their hue;

Maiden pinks of odour faint,

Daisies smell-less, but most quaint,

And sweet thyme true.

Primrose, first-born child of Ver,
Merry spring-time's harbinger,
With her bells dim;

Oxlips in their cradles growing,
Marygolds on death-beds blowing,
Lark-heels trim.

All dear nature's children sweet,
Lie 'fore bride and bridegroom's feet,
Blessing their sense; (strew flowers)
Not an angel of the air,

Bird melodious, or bird fair,

Be absent hence.

THE PRIMROSE.

J. FLETCHER.

Ask me why I send you here
This sweet infanta of the year?

Ask me why I send to you

This primrose all bepearled with dew?

I will whisper in your ears

The sweets of love are washed with tears.

Ask me why this flower does shew

So yellow green, and sickly too?
Ask me why the stalk is weak,

And bending, yet it doth not break?
I will answer, these discover

What fainting hopes are in a lover.

HERRICK.