278 POPULAR TALES OF FLOWERS 
upon a bed of roses. The Rose was his mother's fa- 
vourite flower; it had ever been sacred to Venus; and 
he heard a sound, as of iow sighing, amongst its leaves ; 
and when he lay down, he felt the drooping petals falling 
upon his lips and around his neck, as if to catch the tears 
that fell. Then it was that Love first kissed the Rose and 
blessed it unawares; for the sweetness and beauty of the 
flov/er sank into his heart. 
WTiilst folded upon his lips, she told him that ages ago 
Jove selected her for the Queen of Flowers and the God- 
dess of Beauty; that nothing human had ever surpassed 
her charms; and that when every image of poetry was 
exhausted, none could equal her own : that from the first 
creation of flowers she had been named “ the ornament of 
the earth, the princess of plants, the eye of the flov/er, the 
blush of beauty, the breath of love;”* that even when 
her leaves had withered, to mark her immortal origin she 
gave not up her breath, but still lived in a spirit of in- 
visible fragrance; that she never knew old age, but sank 
to sleep in perfume, in the full perfection of her beauty, 
for she was the fairest daughter that was born of the 
Mother of Love. 
So Love found his sweet and long-lost sister in tiie 
Rose, and she first spoke to him in the old language of 
the flowers, giving him a new lesson every day; until not 
a bell bowed, nor a bud expanded, nor a blossom opened 
its beautiful lips, but what I,ove knew every word it whis- 
pered. 
For days did Love linger with his sweet sister, the 
Rose, before he again set out on his pilgrimage; but his 
journey was now no longer lonely ; he found a companion 
in every flov^er by the wayside, and held converse with 
every bud that dwelt within its green homestead of leaves. 
The Honeysuckle told him how, in the olden age, she 
was the emblem of Devoted Affection; how she twined 
over rural and primeval huts, when love alone was counted 
happiness, and the only wealth man coveted was the pos- 
session of a true heart — one that loved for evermore, and 
throughout all the changes of time -for ever remained the 
same. 
* Fragment attributed to Sappho. 
