loo THE ASSOCIATIONS OF FLOWERS 
leaves, formed of a number of leaflets, growing on each 
side of one stalk, as in the tansy ; and this plant will 
not only fold during darkness, but when the light is too 
powerful. 
Many compound flowers, as the daisy, have their florets 
or rays in an erect posture in the night. Like 
“ The marigold which goes to bed with the sim, 
And with him rises weeping.” 
This sleep of the blossoms was discovered by Chaucer. 
He had all a poet’s fondness for the daisy, which in his 
time was called, as it now is in France, by the name of 
Marguerite, and was considered an emblem of constancy 
and love. Chaucer would lie for hours on the greensw^ard 
of the meadow, looking at it, and framing dreams of 
poesy, in which he represented trains of fair ladies and 
brave knights coming out to greet it. He visited the 
meadow with the sun, and saw the white or crimson-tipped 
petals of the little flower gradually unfold as his shining 
dispelled the darkness ; and then he marked how evening 
came again, and its rays closed once more over its yellow 
disk, and the “silver droppes hanging in the leaves,” 
warned him that night was coming. 
The appearance presented by vegetation during night 
is not, however, seen so plainly in a plant standing alone, 
as when it occurs in groups. “Thus,” says Professor 
Lindley, “ plants of corn, in which there is very little 
indication of sleep, when growing singly, exhibit this 
phenomenon very distinctly when observed in masses; 
their leaves becoming flaccid, and their ears drooping at 
night.” 
When by an eclipse of the sun darkness is spread over 
the face of nature at an unusual time, not only do the 
birds, mistaking the veil for that of night, betake them- 
selves to their accustomed repose, but flowers and leaves 
are affected by it. This was obsen’able during the last 
eclipse, in the garden pheasant’s-eye (Adonis autumnalis). 
This flower, which usually closes for the night at four 
o'clock, folded up rapidly as the darkness occurred, which 
w^as some hours previous to its ordinary^ time of enfolding. 
On the other hand, if the light of a candle be ad- 
