Cogliete le rose finché potete

By 1908 the Pre-Raphaelite manner Waterhouse worked in was well out of fashion, and the newer painting coming out of Paris looked nothing like this. He kept to his own path anyway. The title comes from a poem Robert Herrick wrote in the 1640s, urging young women to enjoy their beauty while it lasts, since time keeps flying. Waterhouse gives us a girl gathering roses, and with her he began several years of what have been called his flower-women: quiet pictures of young women among blossoms, with no story to tell beyond the mood. He liked the line enough to use it twice. The next year, in 1909, he painted a completely different scene under the very same title.