18 
LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
roses is celebrated as a favourite gift of love ; and, in 
JLmadis de Gaul, the captive Oriana is represented 
as throwing to her lover a rose wet with tears, as 
the sweetest pledge of her unalterable faith. The 
various allegorical meanings which were in the 
middle ages attached to the rose are described in the 
celebrated Romaunt de la Rose, which was com¬ 
menced, in the year 1620, by Guillaume de Lorris, 
and finished, forty years later, by Jean de Meun. 
In the famous German Heldenbuch, or Book of 
Heroes, which is supposed to have been chiefly 
written by Henry von Ofterdingen, the Rose Gar¬ 
den ofWurms holds a distinguished place. The 
garden was encircled by a silken thread instead of a 
wall, and the victorious knights who defended it 
against the encroachments of a party of giants 
were, by Princess Chrymhilde, rewarded with a 
chaplet of roses and a kiss. One of the knights, 
named Hildebrandt, is described as having accepted 
the chaplet but declined the salute. A monk 
named Ilsan, however, who was one of the trium¬ 
phant warriors, not satisfied with the rewards con¬ 
ferred on himself, demanded a chaplet and a kiss 
for each of the fifty-two monks of the convent to 
which he belonged. It is added that Chrymhilde 
