222 BRAMBLES AND BAY LEAVES. 



All nations have endeavoured to convey, by flowers, those senti- 

 ments which they found unutterable in words, and this especially in 

 the floral customs attending the hallowed rites of burial. The Greeks 

 lavished flowers in their funeral ceremonies ; they crowned the dead 

 with them, and they were scattered in the path of the mourners. It 

 is said that, when Orpheus bewailed the fate of his beloved Euridyce, 

 the sweet sounds of his lyre caused a forest of elms to spring up. 

 The idea is but an expression of the sympathy between man's heart 

 and the symbols of outward nature. The Greeks decked the funeral 

 pyre with garlands of flowers, and rendered it odorous with spices 

 and other fragrant things. A statue, called tlie funeral genius, was 

 usually placed in the groves, wherein were deposited the ashes of the 

 departed. 



" They feared not death, whose calm and gracious thought 

 Of the last hour had settled thus In thee : 

 They, who thy wreath of pallid roses wrought. 



And laid thy head upon the forest tree, 

 As that of one, by music's dreamy close, 

 On the wood violets lulled to deep repose." 



Mrs. Hemans. 



With the Romans, it was considered a duty incumbent on children 

 to deck with flowers the bodies and places of sepulture of their pa- 

 rents ; and the parents were required to pay similar honours to the 

 graves of their offspring. The despairing Dido immolated herself 

 while crowned with 



" Sad cypress, vervain, yew, 



And every baleful flower denoting death." 



And Diodorous tells us that, when the Hindoo widow is burned upon 

 the funeral pyre of her husband, she is " crowned by the women of 

 her house." At Tripoli, the coffins are adorned with rich bouquets 

 of flowers, when the funeral ceremony takes place. Tully tells us of 

 a lady of high rank, who erected for her deceased daughter one of 

 the grandest mausoleums in Tripoli, and kept it regularly supplied 

 with the choicest flowers, placed in beautiful vases ; and, in addition 

 to these, a quantity of fresh Arabian jasmine blossoms, threaded 

 on thin slips of the palm leaf, were hung in festoons and tas- 

 sels about this revered sepulchre. Chateaubriand tells us of the 

 funeral customs of the North American Indians, who bury their dead 



