INTRODUCTION. 
13 
read in it some secret message. He pressed it 
to his bosom, then fastened it in his turban, and, 
after making some signs towards the window, 
he withdrew. The young gallant appeared from 
his dress to be nothing more than a poor water- 
carrier. But the Turkish proverb says that, 
however high a woman may rear her head to¬ 
wards the clouds, her feet nevertheless touch the 
earth. The girl was actually the daughter of a 
rich Jew, worth a hundred thousand piastres. 
A nosegay,, or garland of flowers, ingeniously 
selected, and put together for the purpose of 
communicating in secret and expressive lan¬ 
guage the sentiments’of the heart, is in.the East 
called a Saam (salutation). It often happens 
that a female slave, the object of the Sultan’s 
favour, corresponds openly with her lover merely 
by the various arrangement of flower-pots in a 
garden. Written love-letters would often be in¬ 
adequate to convey an idea of the passionate 
feelings which are thus expressed through the 
medium of flowers. Thus, orange flowers sig¬ 
nify hope; marigolds, despair; sunflowers, con¬ 
stancy ; roses, beauty; and tulips represent the 
complaints of infidelity. 
