5o IV/LD, OR NATIVE FLOWERS. 



the rude rocks, and fling a robe of luxuriant vegetation over decaying 

 fallen timber, concealing that which is unseemly with grace and beauty. 



" Sweet flower, that in the lonely wood 



And tangled forest, clothest the rude twisted roots 



Of lofty pine and feathery hemlock, 



Witli thy flower-decked garland ever green ; 



Thy modest, drooping, rosy bells of fairy lightness 



Wave gently to the passing breeze, 



Diffusing fragrance." 



This pretty, graceful little plant was named in honour of the great 

 father of botany, the good Linnaeus, who chose it more especially as 

 his own flower when he plucked it first in Bothnia : by his wish it was 

 adopted for the crest of his coat of arms. 



The little flower has been immortalised by the great botanist. It 

 is said that one of his pupils aware of his great master's love for the 

 plant, when visiting China, caused a service of fine porcelain to be made 

 and decorated with wreaths of the Linnsa, as a present to Linnaeus, and 

 as a mark of his grateful remembrance. 



At the death of the great naturalist, Cardinal de Noailles erected a 

 cenotaph in his garden, to his memory, and planted this little northern 

 flower at its base for the sake of him whose name it bears.* 



At every joint the Linnaea puts forth white, fibrous rootlets, thus in- 

 creasing and perpetuating the growth of the plant till it forms a tangled, 

 mass of leafy branches. The leaves are round, slightly crenate with 

 a deeper notch at the top, and together with the younger stalks are some- 

 what hairy. They are placed in opposite pairs, from the centre of each 

 of which rises a slender flower stalk, forking near the summit, and bearing 

 a pair of delicate, rose-tinted drooping bells, veined with lines of a 

 deeper ])ink. The throat of the bell is tubular, as in the Honey-suckle 

 and is thickly beset with silvery, woolly hairs. Stamens four, two of 

 them shorter than the others ; the corolla is divided near the margin into 

 five pointed segments. Seed vessel a dry, three-celled, but one-seeded 

 pod. 



If planted for cultivation, the ground should be shaded and some- 

 what damp. In an artificial rock-work, sufficiently protected from the 

 glare of sunshine and kept moist in hot days, it would grow luxuriantly 

 and throw its evergreen matted branches over and among the stones with 

 pretty effect. The blossoms give out a delicate fragrance, especially at 

 dewfall, the scent being scarcely perceptible during the noontide heat. 



• Ste Mius Brigtitwc'U'B Life of LiniuL-us, 



