AND FLOWERS OF POETRY. 107 
ceremony. They considered death as the dawning of a life 
which should never cease. 
Gives not the hawthorn-bush a sweeter shade 
To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep, 
Than doth a rich embroidered canopy 
To kings, that fear their subjects’ treachery? 
Oh! yes, it doth; a thousand-fold it doth. 
Fair Hope, with light and buoyant form, 
Came smiling through the clouds of Care, 
Glanced bright defiance on the storm, 
And hung her bow of promise there. 
f. s. o. 
HYPOCRISY. 
EBONY. 
Pluto, god of the infernal regions, was seated upon a throne 
of ebony. We say of one notoriously wicked, that “he has a 
heart as black as ebony.” This proverb originated in the 
circumstance of the aubier of the ebony-tree being white, its 
foliage soft and silvery, its flowers brilliant and beautiful, while 
the heart only of the tree is black. 
Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks 
Invisible, except to God alone, 
By his permissive will through heaven and earth. 
Milton. 
