26 LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 



popular in this country, has little claim to so 

 refined an origin, as either purity or the delicacy 

 of passion. We had been taught to believe 

 that it served as a means of communication 

 between the prisoners of the harem and their 

 friends or lovers without : but how could it be 

 thus used, when the emblematic nosegay must 

 convey as much intelligence to the guardians 

 and fellow-prisoners of one of the parties, as to 

 the party herself? The truth appears to be 

 that the 4 Language of Flowers' and other 

 inanimate objects, has arisen in the idleness of 

 the harem, from the desire of amusement and 

 variety which the ladies shut up there, without 

 employment, and without culture, must feel. 

 It answers the purpose of enigmas, the solution 

 of which, amuses the vacant hours of the 

 Turkish ladies, and is founded on a sort of 

 crambo or bout rimt, of which M. HAMMER 

 has given not less than an hundred specimens." 

 We quote one of the specimens given by this 

 ingenious Frenchman, in the Turkish and Eng- 

 lish languages : 



" Armonde wer bana bir Ominde." 

 " Pear Let me not Despair." 



