Page:The Romance of Nature; or, The Flower-Seasons Illustrated.djvu/243

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In a very beautiful but I believe anonymous poem of the time of Charles I. is so elegant an allusion to the Rose, that I shall make it my concluding extract from these records of the Garden Queen; especially as the warning tone may be listened to, with equal propriety, by the gay and "inconstant" fair ones of the present day as by their predecessors, the coquettes of the olden time.

I do confess thou'rt smooth and fair,

And I might have gone near to love thee,

Had I not found the slightest prayer

That lips could speak, had power to move thee:

But I can let thee now alone

As worthy to be loved by none.

I do confess thee sweet, yet find

Thou'rt such an unthrift of thy sweets,

Thy favours are but like the wind,

That kisseth every thing it meets;