Under a mantle of frost-work and snow,

Close by the arc of the fairy-queen’s ring,

Sleeping in delicate grottoes of ice,

Clusters of violets dream of the spring.

—D. CHAUNCEY BREWER.

That strain again! It had a dying fall:

Oh! it came o’er my ear like the sweet south,

That breathes upon a bank of violets

Stealing and giving odor.

—WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

Slow rose the silken-fringÈd lids, and eyes

Like violets wet with dew drank in the light.

—GRACE GREENWOOD.

The careful little violet,

She makes me think of you,

Holding her leafy petticoats

From out the morning dew.

—ALICE CARY.

The violet breathes, by our door, as sweetly

As in the air of her native East.

—WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

When the earliest violets ope

On the sunniest southern slope,

When the air is sweet and keen

Ere the full-blown flower is seen,

When that blithe, forerunning air

Breathes more hope than thou canst bear,

Thou, oh buried, broken heart,

Into quivering life shalt start.

—EDITH M. THOMAS.

The wind-flowers and the violets were still too sound asleep,

Under the snow’s warm blanket, close folded, soft and deep.

—CELIA THAXTER.

Beautiful maid, discreet,

Where is the mate that is meet,

Meet for thee—strive as he could—

Yet will I kneel at thy feet,

Fearing another one should,

Violet!

—COSMO MONKHOUSE.

Violets, shy violets,

How many hearts with thee compare,

Who hide themselves in thickest green,

And thence unseen

Ravish the enraptured air

With sweetness, dewy, fresh and fair!

—ANONYMOUS.

I think the very violets

Are looking the way you’ll come!

—ALICE CARY.

Once, long ago, in summer’s glow,

We threaded, you and I,

A garden’s maze of pleasant ways,

Whose beauty charmed the eye,—

Where violets bent in sweet content

And pinks stood proud and high.

—ELIZABETH AKERS ALLEN.

Then, feeble man, be wise, tak tent

How industry can fetch content.

Behold the bees where’er they wing,

Or through the bonny bowers o’ spring,

Where violets or roses blaw,

An’ siller dew-draps nightly fa’.

—ROBERT FERGUSON.

In her hair the sunbeams nest,

And in her eyes the violets blow,

While in the summer of her breast

The songbird thoughts flit to and fro.

—ETHEL M. KELLEY.

Violets steeped in dreamy odors,

Humble as the Mother mild,

Blue as were her eyes when watching

O’er her sleeping child.

—ADELAIDE PROCTOR.

O Mother Nature, kind to every child

Blessed with the gift of speech, the gift of grace,

Teach thou the modest violet, shy and wild,

To look with trustfulness into my face.

—ISAAC B. CHOATE.

In Farsistan the violet spreads

Its leaves to the rival sky.

—RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

My love, whose lips are softer far

Than drowsy poppy petals are,

And sweeter than the violet.

—ANDREW LANG.

From wintry days blue violets shrink

From wintry lives blue eyes will turn.

—HARRISON ROBERTSON.

Her eyes be like the violets

Ablow in Sudbury lane;

When she doth smile, her face is sweet

As blossoms after rain.

—LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE.

Through jocund reel, or measured tread

Of stately minuet,

Like fairy vision shone the bloom

Of rose and violet,

As, hand in hand with Washington,

The hero of the day,

The smiling face and nymph-like grace

Of Nancy led the way.

—ZITELLA COCKE.

You violets that first appear,

By your pure purple mantles known

Like the proud virgins of the year,

As if the spring were all your own,—

What are you when the Rose is blown?

—SIR HENRY WOTTON.

Rock-gnawing lichens that forerun the feet

Of violets.

—JOHN T. TROWBRIDGE.

True Brahmin, in the meadows wet,

Expound the Vedas of the violet!

—RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

Soon again shall music swell the breeze;

Soon, issuing forth, shall glitter through the trees

Vestures of nuptial white; and hymns be sung

And violets scattered round; and old and young

In every cottage porch with garlands green,

Stand still to gaze, and gazing, bless the

CHAPTER THREE

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