To a garden luxuriously verdant
and enamelled with countless flowers,
there came one day the two goddesses
of Love, and of dense forests and Hunting.

Then Diana plucked a perfect rose
and Venus the best of the red lilies,
but exceeding by far all the other flowers
in beauty and grace were the violas.

They asked Cupid, who was standing near,
which of the blooms, in his opinion,
was sweetest, purest and most lovely?

The youngster answered with a grin:
— all three are gorgeous, but I much prefer
viola-tion to mere rose and lily.