FLOWERS OF THOUGHT. 
77 
amid thunder and darkness, in that fathomless and 
shoreless ocean of molten flames. Mysterious flower! 
we know not at what hallowed font thou wert first 
named, — whether thou wert christened in smiles or 
tears,— or, amid the maimed rites of some heart¬ 
breaking ceremony, wert first named the everlasting 
flower of undying thought. 
The White Rose has long been considered as 
sacred to Silence: over whatever company it was 
suspended, no secrets were ever revealed, for it 
hung only above the festal board of sworn friend¬ 
ship. No matter how deep they might drink, or 
how long the wine-cup might circulate round the 
table, so long as the White Rose hung over their 
heads, every secret was considered inviolable; no 
matter how trivial, or how important the trust, 
beneath that flower it was never betrayed, for 
around it was written the sentence— 
“ HE WHO DOTH SECRETS REVEAL 
BENEATH MY ROOF SHALL NEVER LIVE.”* 
* Such is the emblem given to the White Hose, in an old work 
entitled the “Bible Herbal,” and published at the close of the 
sixteenth century — while Shakspeare himself was living. 
