F OVULAR TALES OF FLOWERS 
330 
no notice of the glass, as through it ebbed slowly the 
ever-moving sand, that his thoughts turned to the cities 
he had laid low, and the countries over which he had 
marched, through many a bygone century. Much he mar- 
velled within himself that the scenes which he had ages 
ago made desolate, should, in spite of his inroads, have 
again recovered their beauty, and in place of the solitude 
and dreariment which he had left behind, be fragrant with 
the breath of thousands of flowers, and alive with the hum 
and murmuring of bees. 
“I will destroy the flowers,” said Time; ‘‘they rob all 
my ruins of their solemnity, and no one can think of 
desolation wherever they are seen to wave : before me 
they spring up, and behind me they arise in the very 
footsteps where I have left the marks of death, decay, 
and desolation : they bloom in the silent aisles of the very 
abbeys which I have unroofed ; and where I have swept 
away every trace of the massy and ornamented roofs of 
the dead, there they come and wave.” 
And as he sat upon the base of the ruined column, he 
began to sharpen his scythe ; but just as he was about to 
commence the work of destruction, one of the wandering 
Spirits of the Flowers rose up before him, and placed her 
hand upon his arm. 
“ Wilt thou spoil the beauty of thine own workman- 
ship?” said the fair Spirit of the Blossoms. “What 
greater victory wouldst thou wish to win over the power 
of man than that which thou hast already obtained ? 
Thou passest over his mighty works, and they crumble 
at thy touch into the dust : thou hast but to sit down and 
look upon the masses of masonry which he has piled 
together, and, beneath thy silent gaze, they moulder slowly 
away. It is over thy workmanship that we scatter the 
flowers, to show that thou hast ended what he but began ; 
we but pile up a monument on those silent shores where 
the pride of man is wrecked. Would thy work be less 
complete if all was blank and desolate ? would weary 
leagues of brown and barren land show the traces of thy 
power? or would they not look like spots over which thy 
wings had never waved? It is the peace and beauty 
which again reign over the places thy hand hath made 
desolate, that hallow the solitude, and point out that. 
