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 procession 
moved—the shadows of three thousand years have 
settled down over the hills and valleys, where those 
beautiful maidens first gathered the flowers of Sum¬ 
mer,—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 ceremonies, 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 he 
