Emily Dickinson Lexicon

HY'A-CINTH, n. [L. hyacinthus; Gr. υακινθος.]

1. In botany, the popular name of some species of a genus of plants. The Oriental hyacinth has a large, purplish, bulbous root, from which spring several narrow erect leaves; the flower stalk is upright and succulent, and adorned with many bell-shaped flowers, united in a large pyramidical spike, of different colors in the varieties. Encyc.
2. In mineralogy, a mineral, a variety of zircon, whose crystals, when distinct, have the form of a four-sided prism, terminated by four rhombic planes, which stand on the lateral edges. Its structure is foliated; its luster, strong; its fracture, conchoidal. Its prevailing color is a hyacinth red, in which the red is more or less tinged with yellow or brown. It is sometimes transparent, and sometimes only translucent. Cleaveland. Hyacinth is a subspecies of pyramidical zircon. Ure.