Page:The Romance of Nature; or, The Flower-Seasons Illustrated.djvu/125

67 THE CROCUS—PRIOR.

The brilliant colours and woody growth of the, make it contrast strikingly with the pale and fragile snow-drop, near whose modest bells this superb native of Japan may often be seen, exhibiting the singular appearance I have described in the illustrative lines. The buds and flowers of brightest crimson, with their golden-coloured anthers, come peering out through the snow wreaths, that lie lightly upon their trained stems; and, to a far less fanciful eye than mine, might well