bleaching linen; the wall-flower, which loved the shade of knightly banners and pennons, and still clings faithfully to falling ruins; king's-spears, flower-gentle, goldilocks, yellow-golds, the flower de luce, flower of light, which great painters have placed in the hands of saintly personages in many a noble work of art; the sweet-daisy or day's-eye, the “eye of day,” as Chaucer has called it.
After such names as these, ought we not to be thoroughly ashamed of appellations like Batschia, Schoberia, Buchnera, Goodyera, Brugmannsia, Heuchera, Scheuzeria, Schizanthus, and as many more to match as you please? Names remarkably well adapted to crocodiles, and rattlesnakes, and scorpions, but little suited, one would think, to the flowers gentle of the field.
There is a modest little blossom known to all the world as having been highly honored in different countries. La Marguerite was probably first named in the chansons of some lover troubadour, some noble brother-in-arms, perhaps, of him who sang Blanche of Castille so sweetly:
| “ | Las! si j'avais pouvoir d'oublier |
| Sa beauté, son bien-dire | |
| Et son tres-doux regarder, | |
| Finirait mon martyre!” |
We may well believe it to have been some such knightly poet who first felt the charm of that simple flower, and blending its name and image with that of his lady-love, sang: “Si douce est la Marguerite!” So long as knights wore arms, and couched lances in behalf of ladies fair, so long was la Marguerite a favored flower of chivalry, honored by all preux chevaliers; knight
