Produced by Eric Eldred, Keith Edkins and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they are listed at the end of the text. Original page numbers are shown as {99}. PROSERPINA. STUDIES OF WAYSIDE FLOWERS, WHILE THE AIR WAS YET PURE _AMONG THE ALPS, AND IN THE SCOTLAND AND ENGLAND WHICH MY FATHER KNEW_. BY JOHN RUSKIN, LL.D., HONORARY STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, AND SLADE PROFESSOR OF FINE ART. "Oh--Proserpina! For the flowers now, which frighted, thou let'st fall From Dis's waggon." VOLUME I. New York: JOHN WILEY & SONS, 15 Astor Place. 1888. * * * * * Press of J. J. Little & Co., Astor Place, New York. * * * * * CONTENTS OF VOL. I PAGE INTRODUCTION, 1 CHAPTER I. MOSS, 12 CHAPTER II. THE ROOT, 26 CHAPTER III. THE LEAF, 40 CHAPTER IV. THE FLOWER, 64 CHAPTER V. PAPAVER RHOEAS, 86 CHAPTER VI. THE PARABLE OF JOASH, 106 CHAPTER VII. THE PARABLE OF JOTHAM, 117 CHAPTER VIII. THE STEM, 127 CHAPTER IX. OUTSIDE AND IN, 151 CHAPTER X. THE BARK, 170 CHAPTER XI. GENEALOGY, 176 CHAPTER XII. CORA AND KRONOS, 205 CHAPTER XIII. THE SEED AND HUSK, 219 CHAPTER XIV. THE FRUIT GIFT, 227 INDEX I. DESCRIPTIVE NOMENCLATURE, 239 INDEX II. ENGLISH NAMES, 255 INDEX III. LATIN OR GREEK NAMES, 258 * * * * * {1} PROSERPINA. INTRODUCTION. BRANTWOOD, _14th March, 1874._ Yesterday evening I was looking over the first book in which I studied Botany,--Curtis's Magazine, published in 1795 at No. 3, St. George's Crescent, Blackfriars Road, and sold by the principal booksellers in Great Britain and Ireland. Its plates are excellent, so that I am always glad to find in it the picture of a flower I know. And I came yesterday upon what I suppose to be a variety of a favourite flower of mine, called, in Curtis, "the St. Bruno's Lily." I am obliged to say "what I suppose to be a variety," because my pet lily is branched,[1] while this is drawn as unbranched, and especially stated to be so. And the page of text, in which this statement is made, is so characteristic of botanical books, and botanical science, not to say all science as hitherto taught for the blessing of mankind; {2} and of the difficulties thereby accompanying its communication, that I extract the page entire, printing it, opposite, as nearly as possible in facsimile.