Preface.
My own love for Flowers, and the intense pleasure they afford me, are my best as well as my true reasons for writing and publishing this volume; for I believed (and surely the feeling was pardonable, even if somewhat self-laudatory) that a record of the thoughts, fancies, and associations which combine to render Flowers and Flower Seasons so precious to me, might, if communicated, enhance the pleasure which others derive from the same sweet sources.
I aim not at conveying scientific information; firstly, because the design of my work is purely poetical; and secondly, because my own knowledge of botany is too limited to allow of my offering any instruction to others.
I love Flowers as forming one of the sweetest lines in the God-written Poetry of Nature: as one of the universal blessings accessible to all nations, climes, and classes; blessings in their own loveliness alone, and in the pleasure ever derivable from the contemplation of
