Soon she too, there, beside him lay,

But still her dear loved wreath she wore :
And it-oh! wondrous sight to see-
Both fruit and blossom bore.

STANZAS.

FROM WARD'S MISCELLANY.

She drooped, as droops the lotus flower,
When summer eves are dim;
And softly swells, from minster tower,
The holy vesper-hymn.

Strayed there a wild bee o'er her breast,
A gale across the stream,

To sear her fair transparent vest,
Or mar its mystic dream?

The wild bee wandered not; the gale
Slept on the dimpling well;
And none beheld how purely pale

Those dew-bent clusters fell.

As beautifully wan, as meek,

As silently declining,

She drooped, for whom these eyes are weak,
This woe-worn heart repining.

No burst of sorrow rent the link
Uniting soul with clay;

Like lotus-flower from river's brink,
Her semblance passed away.

"Flower of the Soul! emblem of sentient Thoughts,
With prayer on prayer to chorded harps ascending,
Till at the clouded portals, humbly bending,
They, like the holy martyrs' pale cohorts,

Wait solemn-while sounds of dew descending
Their presence recognize, approve, and bless ;-
Flower! shedding fragrance from a dark recess,
Thy roots lie passive in this mortal soil;

Thy beauty blooms on high-serene, beyond our coil!"
QUOTED IN HORNE'S NEW SPIRIT OF THE AGE.

How fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean
Are thy returns! ev'n as the flowers in spring;
To which, besides their own demean,
The late past frosts tributes of pleasure bring.
Grief melts away like snow in May;

As if there were no such cold thing.

Who would have thought my shrivell❜d heart Could have recovered greenness? It was gone Quite under ground, as flowers depart

To see their mother root, when they have blown; Where they, together, all the hard weather, Dead to the world, keep house unknown.

These are thy wonders, Lord of Power!
Killing and quick'ning, bringing down to Hell,
And up to heaven in an hour;

Making a chiming of a passing bell,
We say amiss, "This or that is;"
Thy word is all, if we could spell.

Oh, that I once past changing were ;

Fast in thy Paradise, where no flow'r can wither!
Many a spring I shoot up fair,

Off'ring at heav'n, growing and groaning thither,
Nor doth my flower want a spring shower,
My sins and I joining together.

But while I grow in a straight line,

Still upward bends as if heav'n were mine own, Thy anger comes, and I decline

What past to that? What pole is not the zone Where all things burn when thou dost turn, And the least frown of thine is shown?

And now in age I bud again:

After so many deaths I live and write:
I once more smell the dew and rain,
And relish versing. O, my only light,
It cannnot be that I am he,

On whom thy tempests fell at night!

These are thy wonders, Lord of Love! To make us see we are but flow'rs that glide: Which when we once can find and prove, Thou hast a garden for us where to bide; Who would be more, swelling through store, Forfeit their Paradise by their pride.

171

CHAPTER VI.

FLORAL CEREMONIES.

"Bring, FLORA, bring thy treasures here,
The pride of all the blooming year,

And let me thence a garland frame."-SHENSTONE.

We have said, in a former chapter, that we can prove the high antiquity of the application of Flowers to ceremonial purposes, and we now proceed to give such proof as is afforded us by the testimony of ancient writers, and of those modern ones who have made a study of the subject; foremost amongst these latter must be ranked the author of "Flora Historica," from whose excellent work we have derived much of the information which follows. "The worship of FLORA," says MR. PHILLIPS, "among the heathen nations, may be traced up to very early days. She was the object of religious veneration among the Phocians and the Sabines, long before the foundation of Rome; and the early Greeks worshipped her under the name of CHLORIS. The Romans instituted a festival in honour of FLORA as early as the time of Romulus, as a kind of rejoicing at the appearance of the blossoms, which they welcomed as the harbingers of fruits. The festival games of FLORALIA were not, however, regular

ly instituted until five hundred and sixteen years after the foundation of Rome, when on consulting the celebrated books of the Sybil, it was ordained that the feast should be annually kept on the 28th day of April, that is four days before the calends of May."-Boun teous May!

"Woods and groves are of thy dressing,

Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing."

AS MILTON Sings, but we shall have much to say of our modern "Feast of Flowers," which, doubtless, had its origin in that above spoken of, and which was introduced by the Roman conquerors into Britain.

"O! fairest of the fabled forms! that stream,
Dressed by wild Fancy, through the poet's dream,
Still may thy attributes of leaves and flowers,
Thy gardens rich, and shrub-o'ershadowed bowers,'
And yellow meads, with spring's first honours bright,
The child's gay heart and frolic step invite;
And while the careless wanderer explores
Th' umbrageous forest or the rugged shores,

Climbs the green down or roams the broom-clad waste,
May Truth and Nature form his future taste!
Goddess! on youth's blest hours thy gifts bestow;
Bind the fair wreath on virgin Beauty's brow,
And still may Fancy's brightest flowers be wove
Round the gold chains of hymeneal love."

CHARLOTTE SMITH.

It is thus that an English poetess apostrophizes the Goddess FLORA, who, according to classical authority, was "married to ZEPHYRUS, and received from him the privilege of presiding over flowers and enjoying perpetual youth."-She was represented by OVID and others as crowned with flowers, and holding in her