Flowers of Mystery 449 



attention. I recall once being seated on the door- 

 step of a deserted farm-house, musing a little over 

 the sad thought of this lost home, when suddenly 

 someone tapped me on the cheek I suppose I 

 ought to say some thing, though it seemed a human 

 touch. It was a spray of Matrimony vine, twenty 

 feet long or more, that had reached around a corner, 

 and helped by a breeze, had appealed to me for sym- 

 pathy and companionship. I answered by following 

 it around the corner. It had been trained up to a 

 little shelf-like ledge or roof, over what had been a 

 pantry window, and hung in long lines of heavy 

 shade. It said to me: "Here once lived a flower- 

 loving woman and a man who cared for her comfort 

 and pleasure. She planted me when she, and the 

 man, and the house were young, and he made the 

 window shelter, and trained me over it, to make 

 cool and green the window where she worked. I 

 was the symbol of their happy married love. See ! 

 there they lie, under the gray stone beneath those 

 cedars. Their children all are far away, but every 

 year I grow fresh and green, though I find it lonely 

 here now." To me, the Matrimony vine is ever a 

 plant of interest, and it may be very beautiful, if 

 cared for. On page 186 is shown the lovely growth 

 on the porch at Van Cortlandt Manor. 



With a sentiment of wonder and inquiry, not un- 

 mixed with mystery, do we regard many flowers, 

 which are described in our botanies as Garden Es- 

 capes. This Matrimony vine is one of the many 

 creeping, climbing things that have wandered away 

 from houses. Honeysuckles and Trumpet-vines 



2 G 



