12 LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
phrases for expressing the sweet sentiments of the 
heart. This language is most generally used by the 
Turkish and Greek women in the Levant, and by 
the African females on the coast of Barbary. 
Castellan, in his “ Letters on Greece,” mentions 
that when he was passing through the lovely valley 
of Bujukderu on the Bosphorus, his attention was 
attracted by a little country pleasure-house, sur¬ 
rounded by a neat garden. Beneath one of the 
grated windows stood a young Turk, who, after 
playing a light prelude on the tambur, a sort of 
mandoline, sang a love-song, in which the following 
verse occurred : — 
The nightingale wanders from flower to flower. 
Seeking the rose, his heart’s only prize ;* 
Thus did my love change every hour, 
Until I saw thee, light of my eyes! 
No soonerwas the song ended than a small white 
hand opened the lattice of the window, and dropped 
a bunch of flowers. The young Turk picked up 
* Alluding to the love of the nightingale for the rose, which 
is a favourite theme of the Oriental poets. The nightingale, f 
a bird of passage in the East, as with us, appears at the season 
when the rose begins to blow. 
