H AWTHORN 
(HOPE.) 
I F the rose is the favourite of poets of all nations, this 
delicious emblem of life-long hope is the especial darling 
of British bards ; and, although there is not a country in all 
Europe where the common Hawthorn does not display its 
scented snowy blossom, it is to the English anthology that 
the florigraphists must refer for full and frequent descriptions 
of its beauties and associations. From the days of dear old 
Chaucer downwards has this chosen bride of May ever been 
belauded by our poets and beloved by our people. 
By the Greeks, Evelyn tells us, the hawthorn was deemed 
one of the fortunate trees : they accounted it a symbol of the 
conjugal union since the jovial shepherds carried it at the rape of 
the Sabines, ever after considering it propitious. Its flowering 
branches were borne aloft at their marriage celebrations, and 
the newly-wedded pair were even lighted to the nuptial cham¬ 
ber with torches of its wood. Lavish, indeed, were the floral 
decorations of a Hellenic bridal; for that clear-headed nation 
fully sympathized with such feelings as Charlotte Smith ex¬ 
presses when she hopes that 
“ Still may fancy’s brightest flowers be wove 
Round the gold chains of hymeneal love.” 
This flower-loving folk still garland their brides with haw¬ 
thorn wreaths, and strew the marriage altar with its bloomy 
treasures. 
In the “ Odyssey,” Homer represents Ulysses, on his return 
to his native land, finding old Laertes, his father, seated in his 
garden alone, having sent his men 
“To search the woods for sets of flowery thorn, 
Their orchards’ bounds to strengthen and adorn.” 
The Turks regard the presentation of a branch ot hawthorn 
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