AN ESSAY ON FLOWERS. 



35 



meadow, and the nameless variety of prairie 

 blossoms. There are few more curious sub- 

 jects of speculation than the modns operandi 

 by which such an infinite diversity of colours 

 are obtained from the same apparent source. 

 This is an exquisite secret of nature's labo- 

 ratory. The physiology of plants has been 

 successfully investigated ; and it is interest- 

 ing to consider that the vitality of flowers is 

 much the same as our own as regards its pro- 

 cess, though so different in kind. They have 

 affinities of sensibility ; they germinate and 

 fructify ; but the elements they assimilate are 

 more subtle than those which sustain animal 

 organization ; yet sun, earth, and air nourish 

 them according to a nutritive principle not 

 unlike that by which our frames are sustained. 

 The reciprocal action between vegetable and 

 organic life, and their respective absorption 

 and diffusion of gases, is one of the most 

 beautiful expositions of science. But the in- 

 stinct of flowers is not less curious ; some 

 fold their leaves at the approach of a storm, 

 and others open and shut at particular hours, 

 so that botanists have rejoiced in floral dials 

 and barometers. Their relation to sight and 

 smell is very obvious ; but that to touch is 

 less regarded, and yet it is extraordinary 

 how the feel of almost every known fabric 

 can be realized by the contact of leaves. 

 Where the touch is sensitive, experiments of 

 this kind may be tried, much to the anmse- 

 ment of the sportive ; for many leaves, if un- 

 perceived, and at the same tinie subject to an 

 exquisite touch, give the sensation of animal, 

 insect, and even mineral substances, indicating 

 how intricately modified are the proportions 

 of fibre, down, juice, and enamel in their 

 composition. 



In their associations, however, flowers are 

 quite independent, both of rare qualities and 

 peculiar beauty. Almost all great men have 

 loved rural seclusion, and have had their fa- 

 vorite villa, island, arbor, or garden-walk. In 

 Switzerland, Germany, and, indeed, every- 

 where on the continent, these places, conse- 

 crated by the partiality or endeared by the 

 memory of genius, are shrines for the travel- 

 ler. Such are Clarens, Vaucluse, and Coppe. 

 Lamartine's tenderness for Milly, his child- 

 hood's home, as exhibited in his late writings, 

 illustrates a sentiment common to all imagi- 

 native and affectionate men; but it is ob- 

 servable that sometimes these charmed spots 



boast no remarkable floral attractions, often 

 only sufficient to make them rural ; a grove 

 of pines, a small vineyard, a picturesque view, 

 and not infrequently a single tree — like the 

 famous old elm at Northampton, amid whose 

 gigantic branches Dr. Edwards, who wrote 

 the celebrated treatise on the Will, was ac- 

 customed to sit and meditate ; — any truly 

 natural object redolent of verdure and shade, 

 is enough. And the hedges of England, the 

 moors of Scotland, the terrace-gardens of 

 Italy, the scrambling, prickly-pear fences of 

 Sicily, and the orchards of America, are at- 

 tractive to the natives of each country, on the 

 same principle. It is the beautiful distinc- 

 tion of flowers that, gathered into magnificent 

 horticultural shows or hidden in lonely nooks, 

 they alike address the sense of beauty, so 

 that a little sprig of forget-me-nots may ex- 

 cite a world of sentiment, and one scarlet ge- 

 ranium irradiate an entire dwelling. 



Flowei-s not only have their phenomena, 

 but their legends. The latter are usually 

 based upon some idea of a sympathetic cha- 

 racter, as that which transforms Daphne into 

 a laurel, and changes the pale hue of a flower 

 to crimson or purple at the occurrence of 

 human shame or misfortune. Even venera- 

 tion is excited by the mysterious natural his- 

 tory of some flowers, or the idea they sym- 

 bolize. Thus the aloe, that blossoms once in 

 a century, and the night-blooming Cereus, 

 which keeps vigil when all other flowers 

 sleep ; and the Passion-flower, in which tlie 

 Catliolics behold the tokens of our Saviour's 

 agony, have a kind of solemn attraction for 

 the eye and fancy. 



There is no little revelation of character in 

 floral preferences. It accords with the hu- 

 manity of Burns that he should celebrate the 

 familiar daisy ; with the delicate ori.':anization 

 of Shelley that a sensitive plant should win 

 his muse ; and with Bryant's genuine Obser- 

 vation of nature that he dedicates a little 

 poem to an inelegant and neglected gentian. 

 It is in harmony with the English idiosjTi- 

 crasy and church attachments of Southey, 

 that his most charming minor poem is in 

 praise of the holly, the symbol of a Christian 

 and national festival ; and no poet but Crabbe 

 would descend to so homely a vegetable pro- 

 duct as kelp. There is no flower more pecu- 

 liar in its beauty and growth than the water- 

 lily; accordingly, Coleridge, with his meta- 



