The language of flowers The floral offering ; a token of affection and esteem ; comprising the language and poetry of flowers
Alone! alone! how drear it is always to be alone!
In such a depth of wilderness, the only thinking one!
The waters in their path rejoice, the trees together sleep--
But I have not one silver voice upon my ear to creep!
_Willis._
* * * * *
Do any thing but love; or, if thou lovest,
And art a woman, hide thy love from him
Whom thou dost worship. Never let him know
How dear he is; flit like a bird before him;
Lead him from tree to tree, from flower to flower;
But be not won; or thou wilt, like that bird,
When caught and caged, be left to pine neglected,
And perish in forgetfulness.
_Miss Landon._
* * * * *
O many a summer’s morning glow
Has lent the rose its ray,
And many a winter’s drifting snow
Has swept its bloom away;
But she has kept the faithless pledge
To this, her winter hour,
And keeps it still, herself alone,
And wasted like the flower.
_O. W. Holmes._
* * * * *
My heart is with its early dream;
It cannot turn away
To seek again the joys of earth,
And mingle with the gay.
The dew-nursed flower that lifts its brow
Beneath the shades of night,
Must wither when the sunbeam sheds
Its too resplendent light.
My heart is with its early dream,
And vainly love’s soft power
Would seek to charm that heart anew,
In some unguarded hour.
I would not that some gentle one
Should hear my frequent sigh;
The deer that bears its death-wound, turns
In loneliness to die.
_Mrs. Embury._
FENNEL.... _Strength_.
Oh, fear not in a world like this,
And thou shalt know ere long,
Know how sublime a thing it is,
To suffer and grow strong.
_Longfellow._
* * * * *
As the slow beast with heavy strength indued
In some wide field by troops of boys pursued,
Though round his sides a wooden tempest rain,
Crops the tall harvest, and lays waste the plain;
Thick on his hide the hollow blows resound,
The patient animal maintains his ground,
Scarce from the field with all their efforts chased,
And stirs but slowly when he stirs at last.
On Ajax thus a weight of Trojans hung,
The strokes redoubled on his buckler rung;
Confiding now in bulky strength he stands,
Now turns, and backward bears the yielding bands:
Now stiff recedes, yet hardly seems to fly,
And threats his followers with retorted eye.
Fixed as the bar between two warring powers,
While hissing darts descend in iron showers:
In his broad buckler many a weapon stood,
Its surface bristled with a quivering wood;
And many a javelin, guiltless, on the plain
Marks the dry dust, and thirsts for blood in vain.
_Pope._
* * * * *
Thrice sounds the clarion; lo! the signal falls,
The den expands, and expectation mute
Gapes round the silent circle’s peopled walls.
Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute,
And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot,
The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe:
Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit
His first attack, wide waving to and fro
His angry tail; red rolls his eye’s dilated glow.
_Byron._
* * * * *
The lusty strength of youth
Is better far than proud decrepitude.
With mind and might and fortitude endued,
We stand erect and fight for present truth.
We’re in the young delight of new existence;
The ardent blood leaps lively in our veins;
The dim traditions glimmering in the distance
We scorn, for objects worthier manly pains.
_MacKellar._
* * * * *
He that of such a height hath built his mind,
And reared the dwelling of his thoughts so strong,
As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame
Of his resolved powers; nor do all the wind
Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong
His settled peace, or to disturb the same:
What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may
The boundless wastes and weilds of man survey!
_Daniel._
COXCOMB.... _Singularity_.
Go then, and if you can, admire the state
Of beaming diamonds, and reflected plate;
Procure a taste to double the surprise,
And gaze on Parian charms with learned eyes:
Be struck with bright brocade, or Tyrian dye,
Or birth-day nobles’ splendid livery.
_Pope._
* * * * *
He also had a quality uncommon
To early risers after a long chase,
Who wake in winter ere the cock can summon
December’s drowsy day to his dull race,--
A quality agreeable to woman,
When her soft liquid words run on apace,
Who likes a listener, whether saint or sinner,--
He did not fall asleep just after dinner;
But, light and airy, stood on the alert,
And shone in the best part of dialogue,
By humouring always what they might assert,
And listening to the topics most in vogue;
Now grave, now gay, but never dull or pert;
And smiling but in secret--cunning rogue!
He ne’er presumed to make an error clearer;
In short, there never was a better hearer.
_Byron._
GRASS.... _Submission_.
According to the Greek historians, Grass was made the symbol of
submission, because the ancient nations of the West gathered Grass and
presented it to the conqueror, to show that they confessed themselves
overcome. The grass is trodden under foot by imperial man; and, instead
of returning to its former vigour with elastic spring, or punishing its
violator like the nettle, yields to its fate--spiritless submission.
* * * * *
It grieves me to the soul
To see how man submits to man’s control;
How overpowered and shackled minds are led
In vulgar tracks, and to submission bred.
_Crabbe._
* * * * *
You shall be as a father to my youth,
My voice shall sound as you do prompt mine ear;
And I will stoop and humble my intents
To your well practised, wise directions.
_Shakspeare._
* * * * *
Romans now
Have thews and limbs like to their ancestors;
But, wo the while! our fathers’ minds are dead,
And we are governed with our mother’s spirits;
Our yoke and sufferance show us womanish.
_Shakspeare._
* * * * *
E’en liberty itself is bartered here.
At gold’s superior charms all freedom flies,
The needy sell it, and the rich man buys;
A land of tyrants, and a den of slaves,
Here wretches seek dishonourable graves,
And, calmly bent, to servitude conform,
Dull as their lakes that slumber in the storm.
_Goldsmith._
* * * * *
Yet, still the loss of wealth is here supplied
By arts, the splendid wrecks of former pride;
From these the feeble heart and long-fallen mind
An easy compensation seem to find.
Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp arrayed,
The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade;
Processions formed for piety and love,
A mistress or a saint in every grove.
By sports like these are all their cares beguiled,
The sports of children satisfy the child;
Each nobler aim, repressed by long control,
Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul;
While low delights, succeeding fast behind,
In happier meanness occupy the mind:
As in those domes, where Cæsars once bore sway,
Defaced by time and tottering in decay,
There in the ruin, heedless of the dead,
The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed;
And, wondering man could want the larger pile,
Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.
_Goldsmith._
FIR.... _Time_.
What does not fade? the tower, that long had stood
The crush of thunder and the warring winds,
Shook by the slow, but sure destroyer, Time,
Now hangs in doubtful ruins o’er its base,
And flinty pyramids and walls of brass
Descend; the Babylonian spires are sunk;
Achaia, Rome, and Egypt moulder down.
Time shakes the stable tyranny of thrones,
And tottering empires crush by their own weight.
_Armstrong._
* * * * *
The clock upon the mantel-piece is ticking;
Thus hour by hour it tolls a funeral chime:
By day and night its calm and constant clicking
Denotes the speed of the old traveller Time.
It is a solemn voice. Who hath an ear
To hear its warning accents, let him hear,
And preparation make to meet the day
When he, alone, shall lie upon the brink
Of human life, and death shall bid him drink
The hemlock cup that none can put away.
What though man turn from the unwelcome theme,
Will Time sit still for man’s forgetfulness?--
To watch and wake were wiser than to dream
And wake at last to wo remediless.
_MacKellar._
* * * * *
The world’s great age begins anew,
The golden years return,
The earth doth like a snake renew
Her winter weeds outworn:
Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam
Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.
A brighter Hellas rears its mountains
From waves serener far;
A new Peneus rolls its fountains
Against the morning-star.
Where fairer Tempes bloom, there sleep
Young Cyclads, on a sunnier deep;
A loftier Argos cleaves the main,
Fraught with a later prize;
Another Orpheus sings again,
And loves, and weeps, and dies.
A new Ulysses leaves once more
Calypso for his native shore.
Oh, write no more the tale of Troy,
If earth Death’s scroll must be!
Nor mix with Laian rage the joy
Which dawns upon the free:
Although a subtile sphinx renew
Riddles of death Thebes never knew,
Another Athens shall arise,
And to remoter time
Bequeath, like sunset to the skies,
The splendour of its prime;
And leave, if naught so bright may live,
All earth can take or heaven can give.
Saturn and Love their long repose
Shall burst, more wise and good
Than all who fell, than one who rose,
Than many unwithstood--
Not gold, nor blood, their altar dowers,
But native tears and symbol flowers.
Oh cease! must hate and death return?
Cease! must men kill and die?
Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn
Of bitter prophecy.
The world is weary of the past--
Oh, might it die or rest at last!
_Shelley._
* * * * *
Time past and time to come are not--
Time present is our only lot;
O God, henceforth our hearts incline
To seek no other love than thine!
_Montgomery._
* * * * *
Then haste thee, Time--’tis kindness all
That speeds thy winged feet so fast;
Thy pleasures stay not till they pall,
And all thy pains are quickly past.
_Bryant._
* * * * *
Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:
Those scraps are good deeds past: which are devoured