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The mystical Language of Flowers, as applied to the passions and sentiments, appears to have had its rise in those sunny regions where the rose springs spontaneously from its native soil, and the jessamine and the tuberose fill with beauty and perfume alike the garden and the wilderness ::

Know ye the land of the cedar and vine,

Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever shine,
Where the light wings of Zephyr, oppressed with perfume,
Wax faint o'er the gardens of Gul in her bloom;
Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit,

And the voice of the nightingale never is mute;

Where the tints of the earth, and the hues of the sky,
In colours though varied, in beauty may vie,

And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye;

Where the virgins are soft as the roses they twine,
And all, save the spirit of man, is divine?"-BYRON.

"Certainly," says a writer in the Edinburgh Magazine of 1818, "the influence of this land of the sun has been felt by the pilgrims from our colder climes, and they have presented to us a pleasing fable in the Language of Flowers, and our imaginations have received with delight the descriptions and interpretations with which we have been favoured from time to time. We have dwelt on, till we have become enamoured of the delicate mode of expressing the rise and progress of love by the gift of the tender rose-bud, or the full blown flower. We have pitied the despair indicated by a present of myrtle interwoven with cypress and poppies, and we believe that these emblems will never cease to convey some similar sentiments, wherever poetry is cultivated or delicacy understood." -The same author continues, "But"-Oh, reader,

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like living gems, the bosom of the earth,-have not these voices-voices of instruction, and reproof, and sympathy, and love, and all that is most gentle and benign? Assuredly they have! Let us then look upon them not as the mere play-things of an idle hour,—as gauds and decorations for the frivolous and vain, but as something too sacred to be made the symbols of false sentiments and feigned, or evil passions. But reverently address them thus:

Ye flowers of beauty, pencilled by the hand
Of God, who annually renews your birth,
To gem the virgin robes of nature chaste,
Ye smiling-featured daughters of the sun!
Fairer than queenly bride by Jordan's stream,
Leading your gentle lives retired, unseen,
Or on the sainted cliffs of Zion's hill

Wandering, and holding with the heavenly dews,
In holy revelry, your nightly loves,

Watched by the stars, and offering every morn

Your incense grateful both to God and man."-POLLOK

Truly the real "Language of Flowers" is no system of unmeaning similitudes; there is a deeper significance attached to every plant and flower, indeed to every object in nature, than the mere sensualist or the shallow sentimentalist would imagine; and here are the words of one who has studied them deeply, and knows that they are types and characters of the glorious revelation, second only to that direct one which God has given us in the Bible. What says he ?

"Listen to the words of wisdom,

Uttered by the tongue of truth,

Tottering age and manly vigour,

Listen ye and smiling youth."-H. G. A.

"Books are great and glorious agents of civilization and happiness. They are the silent teachers of mankind, filling the mind with wisdom, and strengthening the understanding for the strife of action; making us powerful and gentle, wise and humble, at the same time. But we cannot be always buried in our books; we must sometimes go out into the sunshine, and it is necessary, in order to enjoy our books, that we should also enjoy the privilege of air and light, drinking in health and vigour, to enable us to make the best and most profitable use of our sedentary hours. In direct opposition then to books, or rather in secret combination with them, we would place flowers- the out-of-door books Nature has so liberally provided for us, in so rich a variety of types and bindings, as to leave us no excuse for not gratifying all our individual tastes. The lover of flowers has this advantage over the lover of books, that he can never be at a loss for variety; but we suspect the classification is somewhat arbitrary, and that there is hardly any one who loves the one, who does not also love the other. The best way to enjoy either is to enjoy both; to take them alternately, so that they may relieve and show off each other to the best advantage. A walk in an open field, and one hour spent in gathering wild flowers, to be afterwards grouped into a vase upon the library table, is by no means the least suggestive preparation for a morning's reading."-Yes, and then, as we inhale their balmy freshness, and look upon their beautiful hues, we shall think of the spots in which we have gathered them, and our spirits will become invigorated, our thoughts more penetrating, and our minds strengthened for the work before us :

THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS.

BY C. F. HOFFMAN.

Teach thee their language? sweet, I know no tongue
No mystic art those gentle things declare,
I ne'er could trace the schoolman's trick among
Created things, so delicate and rare:

Their language? Prythee! why they are themselves
But bright thoughts syllabled to shape and hue,
The tongue that erst was spoken by the elves,
When tenderness as yet within the world was new.

And oh, do not their soft and starry eyes

Now bent to earth, to heaven now meekly pleading, Their incense fainting as it seeks the skies,

Yet still from earth with freshening hope recedingSay, do not these to every heart declare,

With all the silent eloquence of truth,

The language that they speak is Nature's prayer,
To give her back those spotless days of youth?

THE ALBANIAN LOVE-LETTER.

BY LEIGH HUNT.

An exquisite invention this,

Worthy of Love's most honied kiss,

This art of writing billet-doux

In buds, and odours, and bright hues,—
In saying all one feels and thinks,

In clever daffodils and pinks,

Uttering (as well as silence may)
The sweetest words the sweetest way:
How fit, too, for the lady's bosom,
The place where billet-doux repose 'em.

How charming in some rural spot,
Combining love with garden plot,
At once to cultivate one's flowers
And one's epistolary powers,

Growing one's own choice words and fancies
In orange tubs, and beds of pansies;
One's sighs and passionate declarations
In odorous rhet'ric of carnations;
Seeing how far one's stocks will reach;
Taking due care one's flowers of speech
To guard from blight as well as bathos,
And watering, every day, one's pathos.

A letter comes just gathered, we
Doat on its tender brilliancy;
Inhale its delicate expression
Of balm and pea; and its confession,
Made with as sweet a maiden blush
As ever morn bedew'd in bush;

And then, when we have kissed its wit,
And heart, in water putting it,
To keep its remarks fresh, go round
Our little eloquent plot of ground;
And with delighted hands compose
Our answer, all of lily and rose,
Of tuberose and of violet,

And little darling (mignionette);

And gratitude and polyanthus,

And flowers that say, "Felt never man thus !"

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