The daisy is the language of flowers at its plainest. Henrietta Dumont's Language of Flowers, published in Philadelphia in 1851, gives it as "Innocence". Kate Greenaway's Language of Flowers, published in London in 1884 and now free on Project Gutenberg, gives the same word. For a set of books that usually disagreed, that is close to unanimous.

It suits the flower's name. "Daisy" comes from Old English dægesege, "day's eye", because the petals open at dawn and close at dusk; medieval Latin called it the "sun's eye". A small, open-faced flower that wakes with the day is an easy picture of innocence, though neither book explains its choice, and it is better not to pretend they did.

Greenaway does not stop at one daisy. Her list gives the garden daisy as "I share your sentiments", the Michaelmas daisy as "Farewell", the party-coloured daisy as "Beauty", and the wild daisy as "I will think of it". That last one is a reminder of what these books were: illustrated gift books, which Cornell University Library's exhibition describes being displayed in the parlour, taken into the garden and kept in the bedroom, where a flower could be a polite way of saying "maybe".

English has also put the daisy to grimmer work. To be "pushing up daisies" is to be dead and buried, with the flowers growing over you. The innocence is the older meaning.