162 FLORA'S LEXICON 



LANE TREE. Platanus. Class 21, Monce- 

 cia. Order : Polyandria. The plane tree 

 has been appropriated as the symbol of ge- 

 nius, because the ancient Athenian philoso- 

 phers generally held their discourses, or re- 

 tired to study under the agreeable shade of 

 its wide-spreading branches, for which it 

 was greatly esteemed at Athens. Xerxes is said to have been so 

 attracted by the charms of a plane tree, that he caused his army 

 of 1,700,000 men to halt, while he adorned the tree with all his 

 jewels, and with those of his concubines, and the principal lords 

 of his court, until the branches were loaded with ornaments of 

 every kind. He called it his mistress and his goddess ; and it 

 was with difficulty that he was persuaded to leave the tree of 

 which he had become so extraordinarily enamoured. 



GENIUS. 



Not all unnoticed are thy forms of love, 

 Peerless America! thy mountains rise 



"With cloudy coronals, and tower above 

 The vegetable kingdom to the skies, 



Calling upon thy sons to gaze with thee, 



Starward in homage of the Deity. 



Thy rivers swell majestic to the sea — 



In one eternal diapason, pour 

 Thy cataracts, the hymn of liberty, 



Teaching the clouds to thunder, — on thy shore 

 The Tritons dash their chariots, and tear 

 The adamantine echoes from their lair. 



Where are thy bards, America? The lyre 

 Hangs in its listless solitude too long; 



Why should the song of nightingales expire, 



Because the rooks are screaming — raise their song 



And still the dissonance their silence brings ! 



Bards of the mountain lyre, awake its strings ! 



Dawes. 



