A NEMONE. 
84 
A well-known writer on floral themes deems it probable 
that it became so ill-omened a symbol on account of the frail 
and delicate appearance of the wild species, which she poeti¬ 
cally describes: “The flush of pale red which tinges the white 
petals of the wood-anemone might well remind us of that 
delicate glow which lingers on the cheek of the consumptive 
sufferer, marking to others the inward decay, but giving a 
lustre and a glow of beauty which deceives its victim.” 
This last hypothesis is probably the true one; and Sir 
William Jones, whose poetry is deeply imbued with Oriental 
learning, thus alludes to the fragility of this flower: 
“ Youth, like a thin anemone, displays 
His silken leaf, and in a mom decays.” 
The same author has translated an ode by the Turkish poet 
Mesihi, in which, amongst other sweet blooms, anemones are 
introduced : 
“ See ! yon anemones their leaves unfold, 
With rubies flaming, and with living gold. ” 
In this country the buds of the wood-anemone are gene¬ 
rally of a snowy whiteness; but sometimes a delicate flush, like 
the blush on a maiden’s cheek, tinges their exquisitely formed 
petals, and sometimes they are found coloured a rosy red. 
“These flowers are like the pleasures of the world,” said 
Shakspeare; and admirably expressive of the transitory nature 
of beauty was that device of a fragile anemone with the motto 
“Brevis est usus” (“ Her reign is short.”) 
The best known species of this flower, the wood-anemone, 
grows very far north, and is common in the woods of North 
America. They are considered very unwholesome for cattle, 
and two kinds which grow on that continent are said to prove 
fatal to animals who eat them. 
Linnaeus observed that the wood-anemone expanded in 
Sweden at the same time that the swallows returned from their 
migration, and British naturalists have observed the same phe¬ 
nomenon. Mrs. Hemans has remarked the beautiful pencilling 
of this flower; and Miss Pratt has favoured us with these 
appropriate lines to wood-anemones : 
“Flowers of the wild wood ! your home is there, 
’Mid all that is fragrant, all that is fair; 
