232 BRAMBLES AND BAY LEAVES. 



poetical meaning, by writing it, at the period of his exile, on his collar 

 of S.S., with the initial letter of his mot, or watchword, Souveigne 

 vous de moy ; thus rendering it the symbol of remembrance, and, 

 like the subsequent fatal roses of York, and Lancaster, and Stuart, 

 the lily of Bourbon, and the violet of Napoleon, an historical flower. 

 Few of those who, at parting, exchange this simple, touching appeal 

 to memory, are aware of the fact, that it was first used as such by a 

 royal Plantagenet prince, who was, perhaps, indebted to the agency 

 of this mystic blossom for the crown of England. It was with his 

 hostess, at that time wife of the Duke of Bretagne, that Henry ex- 

 changed this token of good- will and remembrance." 



The common hawthorn is one of the most interesting of our wild 

 plants, as to its historical associations. It was the distinguishing 

 badge of the royal house of Tudor. Miss Strickland states, in the 

 work we have already quoted, that when the body of Richard III. 

 was slain at Eedmore Heath, it was plundered of its armour and 

 ornaments. " The crown was hidden by a soldier in a hawthorn 

 bush, but was soon found, and carried back to Lord Stanley, who 

 placed it on the head of his son-in-law, saluting him by the title of 

 Henry YII., while the victorious army sang Te Deum on the blood- 

 stained heath. 



' Oh ! Redmore, then it seemed thy name was not in vain ! ' 



It was in memory of this picturesque fact, that the red-berried haw- 

 thorn once sheltered the crown of England, that the house of Tudor 

 assxmied the device of a crown in a bush of fruited hawthorn. The 

 proverb of ' Cleave to the crown though it hang on a bush,' alludes 

 to the same circumstance." 



The hawthorn is a memorial plant of that unhappy and ill-fated 

 flower, the lovely Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots. At the eastern side 

 of the village of Duddingstone there stood an ancient hawthorn, 

 stately in dimensions, and picturesque in character. It had 

 smiled in the summer's sun, and had braved the winter's sleet 

 for three good centuries. It stood on the side of the footpath, hanging 

 over the road, and all the spring and summer time it delighted the 

 wayfarer with its goodly foliage, and stood a brave old tree, promis- 

 ing to produce its clusters of fragrant blossoms for many a century 

 to come. But a tremendous tempest in 1836, which made sad havoc 

 among the aged sons of the forest, and strewed the coast with shat-*- 



