THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
67 
It was a favorite with Milton. Eve bids Adam 
“ Direct the clasping ivy where to climb.” 
Wordsworth, speaking of an old church, overgrown 
With ivy, gives us this pretty picture : — 
“ Dying insensibly away 
From human thoughts and purposes, 
The building seems, wall, roof, and tower, 
To bow to some transforming power, 
And blend with the surrounding trees.” 
“ Hast thou seen, in winter’s stormiest day, 
The trunk of a blighted oak; 
Hot dead, but sinking in slow decay, 
Beneath Time’s resistless stroke; 
Bound which a luxuriant ivy had grown, 
And wreathed it with verdure no longer its own? 
O, smile not, nor think it a worthless thing, 
If it be with instruction fraught — 
That which will closest and longest cling 
Is alone worth a serious thought. 
Should aught be unlovely which thus can shed 
Grace on the dying, and leaves not the dead ? ” 
Barton. 
With the Ivy Song of Mrs. Hemans, we end. 
“ O, how could fancy crown with thee, 
In ancient days, the God of Wine, 
And bid thee at the banquet be 
Companion of the vine ? 
Ivy! thy home is where each sound 
Of revelry hath long been o’er, 
Where song and beaker once went round, 
But now are known no more. 
Where long fallen gods recline, 
There the place is thine. 
The Roman on his battle plains, 
Where kings before his eagles bent, 
With thee, amidst exulting strains, 
Shadowed the victor’s tent. 
<S 
