The Adonis flower (_Flos Adonis_) spoken of by Ben Jonson and others has nothing to do with the anemone. It is a kind of camomile. "Some have taken the red kind to be a kind of Anemone," says Parkinson. "The most usual name now with us is _Flos Adonis_. In English it is also called the Mayweed and Rosarubie and Adonis Flower."
HAREBELL (_Scilla nutans_).[45] The "azured harebell," which Shakespeare uses in "Cymbeline" for comparison with the delicate veins of _Fidele_ (_Imogen_), has been identified as the English jacinth, blue harebell, or hare's-bell. Browne's "Pastorals" show that this flower was only worn by faithful lovers; and, therefore, the flower is most appropriately selected for association with _Imogen_. Browne says:
The Harebell, for her stainless, azured hue Claims to be worn of none but who are true.
This flower is also called the "wild hyacinth." Blossoming in May and June, it is one of the precious ornaments of English woods. "Dust of sapphire," its jewel-like flowers have been called.
"Our English jacinth, or harebells," writes Parkinson, "is so common everywhere that it scarce needeth any description. It beareth divers long narrow green leaves, not standing upright, not yet fully lying on the ground, among which springeth up the stalk, bearing at the top many long and hollow flowers, hanging down their heads, all forwards, for the most part, parted at the brims into six parts, turning up their points a little again, of a sweetish, but heady, scent, like unto the Grapeflower. The heads for seed are long and square, wherein is much black seed. The color of the flowers is in some of a deep blue tending to purple, in others of a paler blue, or of a bleak blue tending to an ash color. Some are pure white and some are parti-colored blue and white; and some are of a fine delayed purplish red, or bluish color, which some call a pearl color."
[Illustration: AN ELIZABETHAN MANOR HOUSE; HADDON HALL]
COLUMBINE (_Aquilegia vulgaris_). "There's fennel for you, and columbines," says _Ophelia_, as she hands the flowers to the courtiers.[46] Shakespeare also mentions the columbine in "Love's Labour's Lost"[47] where _Don Armado_, the "fantastical Spaniard" (a caricature of a real person at Queen Elizabeth's court), exclaims, "I am that flower," to which _Dumain_ and _Longueville_ reply in derision, "That mint! That columbine!" Of the columbine of Shakespeare's time, Parkinson says: