LOVE AND THE FLOWERS. 
11 
of temples, whose origin even Antiquity has for¬ 
gotten, we see in the life-like marble of the figures, 
brows which are wreathed with blossoms, and in the 
broken fresco we find groups of maidens strewing 
the pathway which leads to the holy shrine with 
flowers,—the carven altar is piled high with them, 
they garland the neck of the victim which their 
priests are about to sacrifice,— and, we know no 
more. Ages have passed away since that pro¬ 
cession moved—the shadows of three thousand 
years have settled down over the hills and valleys, 
where those beautiful maidens first gathered the 
flowers of Summer,— history has left no record 
of their existence—the language in which they 
breathed their loves, their hopes, and their fears, 
has died away — even their name as a nation 
is forgotten: and all we know is, that their 
men looked noble, and their women beautiful, 
and that flowers were used in their sacred cere¬ 
monies, and that all, excepting the mute figures 
upon the marble, have long since passed away. 
We sigh, and try in vain to decipher these ancient 
emblems. 
Love turned to the fables of the Heathen Poets, 
and there he found that those whose beauty the 
gods could not lift into immortality, they changed 
into flowers ; as if they considered that, next to the 
glory of being enthroned upon Olympus, was to be 
