Ah, Boyce, that could be it. The old musk hyacinth is not exactly yellow,
but it is sort of yellowish sometimes. This is the plant variously known
as
Muscari moschatum, M. ambrosiacum and M. muscarimi among other names. And
it
looks a lot more like a squill than my guess, a daffodil, does.

Muscari macrocarpum, the truly yellow musk hyacinth, has a more western
distribution (the Aegean) and does not grow wild in the area in question.

One thing bothers me about this candidate: surely Sackville-West knew the
musk hyacinth? The plant had by then been grown in England for three
hundred
years, and was readily available in commerce at that time (it disappeared
from general commerce after the Second World War and was a great rarity
when
I was a kid; it did not reappear - in the guise of M. ambrosiacum - until
decades later).

Can anyone come up with a better suggestion?

Jim McKenney

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