No sweeter fragrance e’er perfumed the gale.
Herrick thus fancifully accounts for its color:
Love, on a day, wise poets tell,
Some time in wrangling spent,
Whether the violet should excel,
Or she, in sweetest scent.
But Venus, having lost the day,
Poore girles, she fell on you,
And beate ye so, as some dare say,
Her blows did make ye blew.