The common name for many aquatic plants with large flowers, belonging to the N. O. Nymphæaceæ. In British use chiefly applied to the white water-lily, Nymphæa alba, and the yellow water-lily, Nuphar lutea. The Australian (blue) water-lily is Nymphæa gigantea.
1549. Compl. Scot., vi. (1872), 67. I sau the vattir lille, quhilk is ane remeid contrar gomoria.
1578. Lyte, Dodoens, II. xxviii. 180. There be two kindes of water Lyllies … the yellow, and the white.
1597. Gerarde, Herbal, II. cclxxxii. 672. The white water Lillie or Nenuphar, hath great round leaues, in shape of a buckler.
1652. Culpepper, Eng. Phys., 120. The white Water-Lilly hath very large, round and thick dark green leaves.
1760. J. Lee, Introd. Bot., App. 317. Lily, Lesser Yellow Water, with fringed Flowers, Menyanthes.
1788. Cowper (title), The Dog and the Water-Lily.
1818. Byron, Ch. Har., IV. lxvii. While, chance, some scattered water-lily sails Down where the shallower wave still tells its bubbling tales.
1820. Shelley, Sensit. Pl., 45. Broad water lilies lay tremulously.
1861. Tennyson, in Ld. Tennyson, Mem. (1897), I. 471. The Isle of Wight is like a water-lily on a blue lake.
1882. Garden, 11 Nov., 421/1. There is the giant blue Water Lily of Australia.
b. Applied to aquatic plants of other orders.
The ‘water lily’ of New Zealand is Ranunculus lyallii.
1653. Walton, Angler, ii. 40. Look down at the bottom of the hil, there in that Meadow, chequered with water Lillies and Lady-smocks.
1882. H. Friend, Devonsh. Plant-n., Water Lily, Iris Pseudacorus.
1886. Cheshire Gloss., Water Lily, the arum lily, Calla palustris.
1893. Wiltshire Gloss., Water-lily (1) Caltha palustris. (2) Ranunculus aquatilis.
