FLORAL CUSTOMS, SUPERSTITIONS, AND HISTORIES. 229 



tions of the East, by which lovers hold unseen communion with each 

 Other by means of flowers. They breathe a lofty spirituality, and flow 

 direct from the fresh and inexhaustible springs of the human heart. 

 Maidens, whose lovers are far away, gather certain plants, and cast 

 them upon the surface of a flowing river, with various mysterious 

 ceremonies. They believe that they thus convey their remembrances 

 to those distant friends whom they hold most dear. And by watch- 

 ing the plants as they float away, they obtain an omen of the fortune 

 which has befallen the adventurer, and a prescience of his destiny. 

 Thomas Moore has given a graphic account of one of these cere- 

 monies. 



" As they passed along a sequestered river after sunset, they saw a 

 young Hindoo girl upon the bank, whose employment seemed to them 

 so strange, that they stopped their palanquins to observe her. She 

 had lighted a small lamp, filled with oil of cocoa, and placing it in an 

 earthern dish, adorned with a wreath ofjloivers, had committed it with 

 a trembling hand to the stream, and was now anxiously watching its 

 progress down the current, heedless of the gay calvacade which had 

 drawn up beside her. Laxla Rookh was all curiosity ; — when one of 

 her attendants, who had lived upon the banks of the Ganges (where 

 this ceremony is so prevalent, that often in the dusk of the evening, 

 the river is seen glittering all over with lights, like the Oton-tala, or 

 Sea of Stars), informed the princess that it was the usual way in which 

 the friends of those who had gone on dangerous voyages offered up 

 their vows for their safe return. If the lamp sunk immediately, the 

 omen was disastrous ; but if it went shining down the stream, and 

 continued burning till entirely out of sight, the return of the beloved 

 object was considered as certain." — Lalla Rookh. 



" One sends a vow to him afar — 

 Oh ! never can the heart 

 Know half the love it cherishes 

 Until it comes to part. 



" A thousand things are then recalled, 

 Though scarcely marked at first ; 

 But lingering thoughts in after hours 

 Betray how they were nursed. 



"Ah! love takes many shapes; at first 

 It comes as flashes fly, 

 That bear the lightnings on their wings, 

 And then in darkness die. 



