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THE COLUMBINE.

THIS flower is made the emblem of folly, either on account of its party-coloured corolla, or in allusion to the shape of its nectary, which turns over like the cap of the old jesters.

AND entwine

The white, the blue, the flesh-like columbine.

W. BROWNE.

THE columbine in tawny often taken,

Is then ascribed to such as are forsaken.

IBID.

THE ALMOND.

THE blushing petals which bedeck the leafless branches of these trees that of old embellished the banks of the Jordan, are made emblematical of heedlessness, from their venturing forth before nature has prepared the foliage for their protection.

LIKE to an almond-tree, mounted high
On top of green Selenis, all alone,

With blossoms brave bedecked daintily;
Whose tender locks do tremble every one,

At every little breath that under heaven is blown.

FAERY QUEEN

MARK well the flow'ring almonds in the wood:
If od❜rous blossoms the bearing branches load,
The glebe will answer to the sylvan reign,
Great heats will follow, and large crops of grain.

DRYDEN.

BROOM.

Even humble broom and osiers have their use.

In the hieroglyphical language of flowers, the broom is made the emblem of Humility from the following historical anecdote.

Fulke, Earl of Anjou, having been guilty of some crime, was enjoined, by way of penance, to go to the Holy Land and submit to castigation. He acquiesced, habited himself in lowly attire, and, as a mark of his humility, wore a sprig of broom in his cap.

The expiation being happily finished, Fulke adopted the name of Plantagenest, from the Latin of this shrub, plantagenesta.

His descendants continued the name, and many successive nobles of the line of Anjou, distinguished themselves by decorating their helmets with this plant.

The arms of Richard the First were, "two lions combatant." Crest, a plantagenista, or broom sprig. Upon his great seal, a broom sprig is placed on each side of his throne. Sandford's Genealogical History.

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the broom,

Yellow and bright as bullion unalloy'd,
Her blossoms.

THE COMMON THISTLE.

THIS plant, that furnishes its seeds with wings by which it flies from hill to dale, too frequently intrudes itself into our fields, to the injury of the farmer's best hopes. It is therefore made the emblem of Importunity.

Now where the thistle blows his feather'd seed, Which frolic zephyrs buffet in the air.

FALCONER.

WIDE o'er the thistly lawn as swells the breeze,
A whitening shower of vegetable down

Amusive floats.

THOMSON.

TOUGH thistles chok'd the fields, and kill'd the corn,
And an unthrifty crop of weeds was born.

DRYDEN.

THE ASPEN TREE.

BIGOTED ignorance states that the cross was made from this tree, since which time the leaves have never known rest, and from hence the emblem seems to have originated.

WHY tremble so, broad aspen tree? Why shake thy leaves, ne'er ceasing? At rest thou never seem'st to be,

For when the air is still and clear,

Or when the nipping gale increasing,
Shakes from thy boughs soft twilight's tear,
Thou tremblest still, broad aspen tree,

And never tranquil seem'st to be.

ANON.

THE STOCK, OR GILLYFLOWER.

LASTING beauty is represented by this flower whose charms, although less graceful than the rose or the lily, are more durable, and consequently embellish the parterre for a greater length of time.

FAIR is the gillyflower of gardens sweet.

GAY.

AND lavish stock, that scents the garden round.

THOMSON.

HERBS and flowers, the beauteous birth

Of the genial womb of earth,

Suffer but a transient death,

From the winter's cruel breath!

Zephyr speaks-serener skies,
Warm the glebe, and they arise!
We, alas! earth's haughty kings,
We that promise mighty things,
Losing soon life's happy prime,
Droop and fade in little time,
Spring returns, but not our bloom,
Still 't is winter in the tomb!

COWPER.

THE MYRTLE.

MYTHOLOGICAL writers state that when Venus first sprang from the bosom of the waves, the Hours preceded her with a garland of myrtle, since which it has been dedicated to the goddess of beauty, and made the emblem of love.

THE lover's myrtle.

THOMSON.

Like a myrtle tree in flower
Taken from an Asian bower,
Where with many a dewy cup,
Nymphs in play had nursed it up.

HUNT'S CATULLUS.

THE lover with the myrtle sprays,

Adorns his crisped tresses.

DRAYTON.

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