Ariel's Heavenly Couch. Primula veris, Cowslip or Key of Heaven, Gaasperplaspark, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
In Shakespeare's The Tempest (1611), Ariel - the benevolent, spying sprite who's been delivered from the evil witch Sycorax by Prospero, whom he's served throughout the play - is about to be set free. Happily he sings:
'Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip’s bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat’s back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.'
You might just imagine Ariel resting in the flower cup at the top in the photo. True, merry heaven for him.
Another name for Cowslip - especially east of the Meuse River where I am now - is Hemelsleutel/hemmelschlötsche, 'Key of Heaven'. The story goes that St Peter, drowsy after his long duty at Heaven's Gate, lets slip his golden key to Earth. There sprouted up our Golden Flower, called in Dutch 'Gulden Sleutelbloem', Gilt Key Flower. Those names are, I think, rather more imaginative than the Latin: 'First in Spring'.
Ariel's Heavenly Couch. Primula veris, Cowslip or Key of Heaven, Gaasperplaspark, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
In Shakespeare's The Tempest (1611), Ariel - the benevolent, spying sprite who's been delivered from the evil witch Sycorax by Prospero, whom he's served throughout the play - is about to be set free. Happily he sings:
'Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip’s bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat’s back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.'
You might just imagine Ariel resting in the flower cup at the top in the photo. True, merry heaven for him.
Another name for Cowslip - especially east of the Meuse River where I am now - is Hemelsleutel/hemmelschlötsche, 'Key of Heaven'. The story goes that St Peter, drowsy after his long duty at Heaven's Gate, lets slip his golden key to Earth. There sprouted up our Golden Flower, called in Dutch 'Gulden Sleutelbloem', Gilt Key Flower. Those names are, I think, rather more imaginative than the Latin: 'First in Spring'.