24 POETICAL LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
things—bora of beauty and nursed in purity, fed upon 
the dews, and seldom looking upon aught less sacred 
than the stars, as if they were more allied to heaven 
than to earth—that if the virtue, and goodness, and love 
which they represent were but practised by mankind, 
they would again make the children of earth what 
they were in the infancy of the world, and man would 
again be found “ only a little lower than the angels.” 
Love flew to the burning East, where Beauty is 
guarded by jealous lattices, and Pride, armed with 
sharp scimitar, stands ever ready, feeling its cold, keen 
edge, and waiting to cut every heart-sprung affec¬ 
tion asunder; to punish a fond look, unaccompanied 
by wealth, with death; and to dig a grave for every 
hallowed feeling that is unattended by Power. Love 
dropped a few flowers in the guarded turret, and then 
concealed himself. A white hand shaped them after 
the fond feelings of her heart, and then her rounded arm 
let them fall from the airy balcony; and the lowly lov¬ 
er who waited below gathered up the banded flowers, 
and placing them upon his heart, bore them away. He 
wept, mused, sighed, and smiled over them in his soli¬ 
tude, until he found their hidden meaning, and spelled 
out, letter by letter, the mysterious language of love. 
