J U N I P E R. 
(PROTECTION.) 
T HIS plant became the emblem of protection, from the cir¬ 
cumstance of the prophet Elijah having been sheltered 
from the persecutions of King Ahab by a juniper of the 
mountains. Says the Psalmist, “ Thou hast been a shelter for 
me, and a strong tower from the enemy.” 
The Italian name for the juniper is Ginebro, which Ariosto, 
by the licence usually permitted to poets, assumed to be a con¬ 
vertible term with Ginevra, the name of his ladye-love; and 
accordingly, in his Seventh Sonnet, he found occasion to im¬ 
mortalize her memory under a floral fancy, as did his great 
compatriot Petrarch, when coupling the name of his adored 
Laura with the laurel — that “Petrarch pale,” whom Mrs. 
Browning has so gloriously sculpt in that magnificent Pan¬ 
theon, “ The Vision of Poets,” as he 
“ Who from his brain-lit heart hath thrown 
A thousand thoughts beneath the sun, 
Each perfumed with the name of on e. 
“Tasso, bard and lover, 
Whose visions were too thin to cover 
The face of a false woman over,” 
determined to follow in the footsteps of his illustrious country¬ 
man, has also left us two sonnets adapted to a similar purpose. 
Noble emblem this with which to cheer the heart of our best 
beloved ! this symbol of the protection which they may find 
in the security of our love—that asylum from the cruel wrongs 
of a careless world. How beautifully has Moore, in one of his 
melodies, expressed this sentiment! a sentiment which em¬ 
bodies the wild, passionate, unselfish ardour of love—of love 
pure and uncontaminated with the taint of earth: 
“ Come, rest in my bosom, my own stricken deer: 
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home is still here; 
Here still is the smile that no cloud can o’ercast, 
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last. 
