The language of flowers The floral offering ; a token of affection and esteem ; comprising the language and poetry of flowers
So long as busy eyes can see,
And hands the treasure get.
“_And after all this toil and moil,
What profit win they thence?_”--
Perhaps a long day’s work may bring
A few poor sordid pence.
But more than hundreds to the rich
Are pennies to the poor,
And thankfully they seek and sell
The Cranberries on the moor.
_Louisa A. Twamley._
* * * * *
The heart of kindness seldom sours or curdles;
The cream of love is in it pure and sweet:
With every charm that human nature girdles,
And every grace of gentleness replete,
The man who has a kindly heart is most
In pattern like his LORD; for where the law
Of kindness rules the heart, the virtues draw
Together in companionship, and post
Themselves around that citadel of love.
The kindly man doth always kindly prove:
He has a word of sweetness for the child--
Of pity for the poor--of sympathy
For all who mourn; and truly glad is he
When through his generous care some sorrowing face has smiled.
There’s music ever in the kindly soul,
For every deed of goodness done is like
A chord set in the heart, and joy doth strike
Upon it oft as memory doth unroll
The immortal page whereon good deeds are writ;
And Heaven gives nothing sweeter to the mind
Than memories of the acts that bless our human kind.
_MacKellar._
IVY.... _Constancy._
In Greece the altar of Hymen was enwreathed with Ivy, and a branch of it
was presented to the new-married couple, as a symbol of the indissoluble
knot. It was sacred to Bacchus, who is represented crowned with Ivy
leaves, as well as those of the vine. It formed the crown of the Greek
and Roman poets; and, in modern times, has been made the poet’s frequent
image of constancy. The Ivy is attached to the earth by its own roots,
and derives no nourishment from the substances to which it clings. The
protector of ruins, it adorns the dilapidated walls which it holds
together; it will not accept every kind of support, but its attachment
ends only with its life.
* * * * *
When all things have their trial, you shall find
Nothing is constant but a virtuous mind.
_Shirley._
* * * * *
The mountain rill
Seeks with no surer flow the far, bright sea,
Than my unchanged affections flow to thee.
_Park Benjamin._
* * * * *
I am constant as the northern star;
Of whose true, fixed, and resting quality
There is no fellow in the firmament.
_Shakspeare._
* * * * *
Make my breast
Transparent as pure crystal, that the world,
Jealous of me, may see the foulest thought
My heart does hold. Where shall a woman turn
Her eyes to find out constancy?
_Buckingham._
* * * * *
No, never from this hour to part,
We’ll live and love so true,
The sigh that rends thy constant heart,
Shall break thy Edwin’s too.
_Goldsmith._
* * * * *
The Ivy round some lofty pile
Its twining tendril flings;
Though fled from thence be pleasure’s smile,
It yet the fonder clings;
As lonelier still becomes the place,
The warmer is its fond embrace,
More firm its verdant rings;
As if it loved its shade to rear
O’er one devoted to despair.
Thus shall my bosom cling to thine,
Unchanged by gliding years;
Through Fortune’s rise, or her decline,
In sunshine, or in tears;
And though between us oceans roll,
And rocks divide us, still my soul
Shall feel no jealous fears:
Confiding in a heart like thine,
Love’s uncontaminated shrine.
_Mrs. Hale._
HOLLY.... _Foresight_.
The Holly, with its scarlet berries, is the most beautiful of the
evergreens that have been used for ages to adorn the churches of old
England, during the Christmas season. It is an ornament to the woods,
stripped bare by the rude breath of winter; its berries serve for food
for the little birds that never leave us, and its foliage affords them
an hospitable shelter during the cold season. Nature, by a seeming
forethought, has been careful to preserve the verdure of this handsome
tree all the year round, and to arm it with thorns, that it may furnish
both food and protection to the innocent creatures which resort to it
for shelter. It may be added, however, that from the bark of the common
Holly, when fermented and washed from the woody fibres, is made the
bird-lime which is used for catching small birds.
* * * * *
With Holly and ivy,
So green and so gay,
We deck up our houses
As fresh as the day;
With bays and rosemary,
And laurel complete,
And every one now
Is a king in conceit.
_Poor Robin’s Almanac, 1695._
* * * * *
THE HOLLY TREE.
O Reader! hast thou ever stood to see
The Holly tree?
The eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves,
Ordered by an intelligence so wise
As might confound the atheist’s sophistries.
Below, a circling fence its leaves are seen,
Wrinkled and keen;
No grazing cattle, through their prickly round
Can reach to wound;
But as they grow where nothing is to fear,
Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear.
I love to view these things with curious eyes
And moralize;
And in this wisdom of the Holly tree
Can emblems see,
Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme,
One which may profit in the after-time.
Thus, though abroad, perchance I might appear
Harsh and austere,
To those who on my leisure would intrude
Reserved and rude,
Gentle at home amid my friends I’d be,
Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree.
And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know,
Some harshness show,
All vain asperities I day by day
Would wear away,
Till the smooth temper of my age should be
Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree.
And as when all the summer trees are seen
So bright and green,
The Holly leaves a sober hue display,
Less bright than they;
But when the bare and wintry woods we see,
What then so cheerful as the Holly tree?
So serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng,
So would I seem amid the young and gay
More grave than they,
That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the Holly tree.
_Southey._
* * * * *
To know the road ere on’t we trust the foot,
And where it leads, and what, while journeying,
We may meet, is Wisdom’s eager wish.
_Peerbold._
* * * * *
Walk
Boldly and wisely in that light thou hast;
There is a hand above will help thee on.
_Bailey._
MEADOW SAFFRON.... _My best days are past_.
The Meadow Saffron, or Colchicum Autumnale, springs up about the time
the leaves begin to fall from the trees, and may, therefore, be said to
proclaim to all nature, that the bright days of summer are past.
According to Ovid, this autumnal flower owes its origin to some drops of
the magic liquor prepared by Medea, to restore the aged Æson to the
bloom and vigour of youth, which were spilled in the fields. As a
medicine, the Colchicum is powerful, but dangerous, and must be used
with caution. The poisonous quality of the plant seems to be known, as
if by instinct, to all kinds of cattle. They all shun it, and in many
pastures this alone will be found standing, when all other herbage has
been consumed.
* * * * *
Why grieve that time has brought so soon
The sober age of manhood on?
As idly should I weep at noon
To see the blush of morning gone.
True, time will sear and blanch my brow:
Well--I shall sit with aged men,
And my good glass will tell me how
A grisly beard becomes me then.
And should no foul dishonour lie
Upon my head when I am gray,
Love yet may search my fading eye,
And smooth the path of my decay.
_Bryant._
* * * * *
Oh! thou who dry’st the mourner’s tear,
How dark this world would be,
If, when deceived and wounded here,
We could not fly to thee!
The friends who in our sunshine live,
When winter comes, are flown;
And he who has but tears to give,
Must weep those tears alone:
But thou wilt heal that broken heart,
Which, like the plants that throw
Their fragrance from the wounded part,
Breathes sweetness out of wo.
_Moore._
* * * * *
Then bright from earth, amid the troubled sky,
Ascends fair Colchicum, with radiant eye,
Warms the cold bosom of the hoary year,
And lights with beauty’s blaze the dusky sphere.
_Darwin._
* * * * *
The world around me groweth gray and old:
My friends are dropping one by one away;
Some live in distant lands--some in the clay
Rest quietly, their mortal moments told.
And when my children gather at my knee
To worship GOD and sing our morning psalm,
Their rising stature whispers unto me
My life is waning towards its evening calm.
_MacKellar._
CHINA ASTER.... _Variety_.
The China Aster begins to blow when other flowers are scarce. It is like
an afterthought of Flora’s, who smiles at leaving us. The China Aster
was introduced into Europe by Father d’Insarville, a Jesuit missionary;
who, about the year 1730, sent seeds of it to the royal gardens of
Paris. As, by cultivation, many varieties of the Aster have been
obtained, the flower has been made the emblem of variety.
* * * * *
The sleepless streams move onward
Through beds of idling lilies,
Chiding the foolish flowers
That watch their mirrored beauty;
So live the thoughtless many,
Who throng the halls of fashion.
_Dawes._
* * * * *
I love the ever-varying hue
Upon the face of heaven;
I would not have it always blue,
But oft with lightning riven.
I would not have wide oceans spread
A mirror e’er to see;
But lashed to many a cresty head
By scowling tempests free!
_C. Watson._
* * * * *
Play every string in love’s sweet lyre--
Set all its music flowing;
Be air, and dew, and light, and fire,
To keep the soul-flower growing.
_Mrs. Osgood._
* * * * *
The rapid and the deep--the fall, the gulf,
Have likenesses in feeling and in life.
And life, so varied, hath more loveliness
In one day than a creeping century
Of sameness.
_Bailey._
* * * * *
Youth loves and lives on change,
Till the soul sighs for sameness; which at last
Becomes variety; and takes its place.
_Bailey._
* * * * *
Variety’s the source of joy below,
From which still fresh revolving pleasures flow;