Chapter IV: The Old Home (9)

Certain it is, let men say what they will, the Pope is the only sovereign power on earth at this moment that stands as the defender of the rights of independent governments, of international law, the equality of sovereign states without regard to size, race, language, or geographical position--the sole champion of those great, eternal, and immutable principles of justice on which depend alike public liberty and individual freedom, the sanctity and inviolability of the family, the peace and order and the very existence of society. If the kings and rulers of this world are with him, or dare utter a feeble whisper to encourage and sustain him, the people are opposed, or cold or indifferent, and pass him by, wagging their heads, saying in a mocking tone, "He trusted in heaven, and let heaven save him."

It were little short of profanity to indicate the contrast between his sublime attitude and the abject and servile attitude of these distinguished countrymen of ours. They but prove themselves slaves to the spirit of the age, and only reflect popular ignorance and passion, and follow the multitude to worship at the shrine of Success, and to trample on the wronged and outraged. He dares arraign the fierce and satanic spirit of the age, to face the enraged multitude, to defy popular opinion or popular passion, to proclaim the truth it condemns, to defend the right it tramples under foot, and uphold the scorned and rejected rights of God, and the inviolability of conscience. It were an insult to truth and justice, to moral greatness and nobility, to dwell on the contrast. His attitude is that of his Master when he trod the wine-press alone, and of the people none were with him. It is grand, it is sublime, beyond the power of mortal man, unless assisted with strength from above. No man, it seems to us, can contemplate his attitude, firm and inflexible, calm and serene, without being filled, if he have any nobility or generosity of soul, or any sense of moral heroism or true manliness in him, with admiration and awe, or feeling that his very attitude proves that he is in the right, and that God is with him. Let our American sympathizers with his traducers and persecutors behold him whom they calumniate, and, if they are men, blush and hang their heads. Shame and confusion should cover their faces!

FOOTNOTES:

[45] Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by REV. I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

[46] 1. _The Unity of Italy._ The American Celebration of the Unity of Italy, at the Academy of Music, New York, Jan. 12, 1871; with the Addresses, Letters, and Comments of the Press. New York: Putnam & Sons. 1871. Imp. 8vo, pp. 197.

2. _Programma Associazione dei Libri Pensatori in Roma._ _La Commissione._ Roma, Febbraio, 1871. Fly-sheet.

[47] The question, Mr. Dana really argues, is, whether Catholics in other than the Roman state have, under the law of nations, a right to insist that by virtue of their donations, or what the law treats as eleemosynary gifts, they shall continue to be vested in the Holy See? The answer must be founded on the acknowledged principle of law, that all gifts of the sort must be invested and appropriated according to the will of the donors; and in the interest of all Catholics in the Holy See, as the mistress and mother of all the churches, Catholics throughout the world have an ethical right that their gifts shall be invested and appropriated to the purposes for which they are given; but we doubt if their right can be juridically asserted, under international law, in the courts of the usurping state, or of any other state, since the state of the church is suppressed. But there can be no doubt, from the relation of all Catholics to the Holy See, the invasion of her rights and despoiling her of possessions, whether absolute or only fiduciary, gives to all Catholic powers the right of war against the invader and despoiler. At the order of the Holy Father, Catholics throughout the world would have the right, even without the license of their temporal sovereigns, to arm for the recovery and restoration to the Holy See of the possessions or trusts of which she may be despoiled, because these possessions and trusts belong to the spirituality, and the Holy Father has plenary authority in spirituals, and is the spiritual sovereign, not the temporal sovereign, of all Catholics. If Italian Catholics had understood that the Roman state belonged to the Holy See, and therefore to the spirituality, they would have understood that no order of their king could bind them to obey him in despoiling the Roman state, or in entering it against the order of the Pope, for in spirituals the spiritual sovereign overrides the temporal sovereign.

[48] Le religioni dette rivelate sono state sempre il più grande nemico della umanità, poichè facendo del vero, patrimonio di tutti, il privilegio di pochi, si opposero allo sviluppo progressivo della scienza e della libertà, le sole capaci di risolvere i più gravi problemi sociali, attorno a cui da secoli si agitano intere generazioni.

Il sacerdote ha inventato degli esseri sopran-naturali, e fattosi mediatore fra questi e gli uomini va predicando ancora uda fede, che sostituisce l'autorità alla ragione, la schiavitù alla libertà, il bruto all'uomo.

Però la tenebra si è diradata, ed il progresso abbatte gl'idoli e svincola l'umana coscienza dalle catene, di cui i sacerdoti l'aveano cinta.

Accanita ferve la lotta fra il dogma ed i postulati della scienza, tra la libertà e la tirannide, fra la scienza e l'errore.

La voce della giustizia, fatta tacere nel sangue da re e preti assieme congiurati, è risorta onnipotente dai penetrali della inquisizione, dalle ceneri dei roghi, da ogni pietra sanctificata dal sangue degli apostoli della verità. Si credeva durasse eterno il regno del male, però l'alba è diventata giorno, la favilla si è fatta incendio. Ora Roma del prete diviene Roma del popolo, la città santa città umana. Non più si presti fede a credenze ipocrite, che sostituendo la forma alla sostanza suscitarono odi tra popoli e popoli, sol perchè gli uni adoravano un dio nella sinagoga e gli altri nella pagoda.

L'associazione dei liberi pensatori si stabilisce qui opportunamente per dare l'ultimo colpo al crollante edificio sacerdotale, fondato nella ignoranza dei molti e per l'astuzia dei pochi. Le verità provate dalla scienza costituiscono la nostra sola fede, il rispetto al diritto proprio nel rispettare il diritto altrui, la nostra morale.

E d'uopo guardare arditamente in faccia quel mostro secolare, che della terra ha fatto un campo di battaglia, sfidarlo all'aperto ed alla luce del giorno. Saremo così fedeli al programma della civiltà, in nome della quale il mondo ha applaudito alla liberazione di Roma dal Papa.

Noi facciamo appello a quanti amano davvero l'indipendenza morale della famiglia, prostituita e fatta schiava dal prete--a quanti vogliono una patria grande e rispettata--a quanti credono alla umana perfettibilità--uniamoci tutti sotto la bandiera della scienza e della giustizia.

A Roma è riservata una gran gloria--quella d'iniziare la terza e più splendida epoca dell'incivilimento umano.

Roma libera deve riparare ai danni arrecati al mondo dalla Roma sacerdotale. Essa può far lo, essa deve farlo. I veri amici della libertà si associino, e non iscendano a patti sol nemico più terribile che abbia avuto l'umana famiglia.

ROMA, Febbraio, 1871. LA COMMISSIONE.

FLOWERS.

I.

To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,
Where things that own not man's dominion dwell,
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen
With the wild flock that never needs a fold,
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean--

Is a pleasure accorded to few only of the dwellers upon earth; seldom indeed to the few who could best appreciate the privilege. A large portion of the sum total of human existence is spent in cities. Outside of these, the wants of life, best supplied by the co-operation of numbers, gather people together in towns and villages. Travelling is generally such only as may be needful in the exercise of trades and professions, with a view to their ultimate end, the accumulation of wealth; or such as exhausted energies demand to fit them for further toil. The invalid, it is true, seeks to revive his failing powers in far-away balmy climates and delicious scenes--and there is a love for his birthplace in the heart of many a wanderer which leads him back time after time to the old homestead, and invests it with countless charms, although bleak and barren its surroundings may be--but to how few individuals it is given, in the fulness of their health and mental faculties, to rove abroad at will through the beauties and sublimities of creation--to look on her rolling oceans and broad lakes; her foaming cataracts and stupendous mountains; on the luxuriant loveliness of the torrid zone, and the icy wonders of the north!

Yet such things always make part of the expectancies, the bright anticipations of youth--the day-dreams, crushed down at last by hard realities. For to generation after generation the story of life is strangely the same. Its general events unfold themselves in a succession marked for each one with singular uniformity; a uniformity, indeed, so susceptible of calculation that on it are based many of its most extended speculations.

Pecuniary interests generally push their claims first and most boldly, because least to be evaded. Then come the petty edicts of an artificial social existence, which command and receive submission before their presence is even suspected, and though their power be neither recognized nor acknowledged. Gradually the turning kaleidoscope of time shows more sombre colors; the path to be trodden is made visible--the mind bends itself to the narrow way--earthly happiness seeks its realization in a circumscribed sphere--and so, one by one, the winged thoughts lower their circle of flight, and the dreamer ceases to dream.

But the love of nature is implanted too deeply in the heart of man to be ever entirely eradicated; and the sentiment finds for itself an expression coextensive with its existence in the universal love of flowers. They have a charm for the eye and soul welling from a deeper source than those graceful forms and brilliant colors, for they are a portion of the great universe. They are a link, and an important one, and the one most exquisitely fashioned, in the mighty chain which holds beside them not only the everlasting hills, but

"Planets, suns, and adamantine spheres."

Year after year they return to us with a beauty which never palls, to make us wiser, and better, and happier; and as punctually they meet from each true heart a greeting fitly due to their fairy manifestations of the same boundless Power which called forth those mightier, sublimer forms of matter so often placed beyond our reach.

Flowers, when mention is made of them in the Old Testament, are consecrated (so to say) by the most lofty associations; they typify virtue--happiness--the Deity himself. When the inspired writer would fain depict in language level to our humble capacity pleasures of which we can have not the most distant idea--the pleasures of man's first terrestrial paradise--he calls it a garden; as the word best embodying to us happiness sinless and complete; and the Deity in the same sacred volume prompted

"The flower of the field, and the lily of the valley,"
(Cant. ii.)

as the most appropriate figures of his own divine holiness. Flowers with lamps of fine gold made part of the decorations of Solomon's temple. The Scriptures were originally written in the land of bold imagery and under a burning sun, where herbage and water constitute wealth; consequently, we find throughout its pages rich pastures and flowing streams suggested themselves as emblems of rewards not only in this world, but of those beyond the grave. Again, the brief span of life, and the uncertainty of all earthly possessions, are imaged by the fading flower and the withered grass; and the prophets in their denunciations of the wicked constantly compare them, in the desolation of utter abandonment, to a garden without water.

Asia has always been the especial land of flowers; from the rose-gardens which Semiramis[49] planted at the foot of Mount Bajistanos, 800 B.C., to the fragrant gardens now to be seen in almost every oriental city. The fame of these rose-gardens extended so far that Alexander the Great, on his Eastern expedition, turned a long way from his course to visit them. The city which Solomon founded, Tadmor in the wilderness (Palmyra), about midway between the Orontes and Euphrates, was celebrated, and indeed derived its name, from the abundance of a magnificent species of palm-tree which grew there. This tree (the _Borassus_ of Lin.) yields a liquor seducing and pernicious, and in taste resembling weak champagne.[50] The ruins of this city and its surroundings are described by travellers as exceedingly imposing. The city of Susa (in Scripture, Susan), in a district lying on the Persian Gulf, was in ancient days the residence of the Persian kings; their summers being spent at Ecbatana, in the cool mountainous district of Media. The name Susa signifies a lily, and is said to have been given on account of the great quantity and beauty of these flowers which grew in its vicinity. The fertility of the land of Bashan is mentioned in Scripture, and its oaks are coupled with the cedars of Lebanon. Media also is mentioned by old writers; and Carmania, north of the Persian Gulf, boasted of vines bearing clusters more than two feet long.

China in modern times calls herself the flowery kingdom, but she is not the only one; in many other parts roses are extensively cultivated for the purpose of distilling from them the ottar (_attah-gul_) of commerce; and the landscape is often converted for a hundred acres into one great rose-garden. It has been estimated that one-half of all the varieties of roses scattered over our gardens were originally brought from Asia; and perhaps, counting the fields planted there for distillation, it may be said that one-half of all in actual bloom adorn that quarter of the globe. Yet the simple wild roses of Asia, like our own wild roses, are very inconspicuous little flowers; it is only under the skilful hand of the florist that each one of those many varieties develops its own peculiar beauties, and we obtain the cultivated roses of the garden. The Afghan province of Turkistan is, in some parts, at the present day famous for its roses. _Balkh_, the modern capital, is so exceedingly hot that each spring the inhabitants in a body leave it for the little village of Mezar; and Mezar boasts of the most beautiful roses in the world--a fragrant red rose which they name _gul-i-surkh_. This peculiar variety grows on the pretended tomb of Ali (whose real monument is at Nedjef). They say that these roses will flourish in no soil but that of Mezar--an experiment (they say) which has been repeatedly tried and failed. Mr. Vambéry, who was there in 1864, says, "They are certainly more lovely and fragrant than any I ever saw."

Mr. Vambéry was sent in 1863, by the Hungarian Academy, on a scientific mission to Central Asia. At Teheran he assumed the dress of a dervish and the name of Hadji Rechid, and in this character he joined a company of twenty-four pilgrims, "ragged and dirty," who were on their return from Mecca to their far-away home in the northeast. They never penetrated his disguise--and with them he traversed an extent of country never before visited by a European. They travelled mostly by night, to avoid the excessive heat. Of course much natural landscape was lost, but we are struck with the abundance of flowers and gardens along this route. One which he mentions is not fascinating, but that was an exception; before leaving Teheran, he visited two European friends near there, and found "Count G---- in a small silk tent in a garden like a caldron; the heat was awful! Mr. Alison was more comfortable in his pleasant garden at Guhalek."

When the pilgrims resumed their journey at Teheran, such as were rich enough hired a camel for two, as partners. Mr. Vambéry soon loaned his animal to a "dirty friend," and joined the pedestrians, who, like true believers--followers of the Prophet--buried all care in one word, _kismet_.[51] As they tramped on (he says), "When their enthusiasm had been sufficiently stimulated by reminiscences of the gardens of Mergolan, Namengan, and Kholand, all began with one accord to sing a telkin (hymn), in which I joined by screaming as loud as I was able Allah ya Allah!"

The gardens at Tabersi, a place where they rested, were very beautiful, also there were "abundance of oranges and lemons, tinted yellow and red with their dark-green leaves." From scenes of luxuriant vegetation they passed into the desert of Turkistan, which extended on all sides, far as eye could reach, like a vast sea of sand, on one side slightly undulating in little hills, like waves in a storm, on the other side level as a calm lake. Not a bird in the air, nor a crawling thing on the earth; "traces of nothing but departed life in the bleaching bones of man or beast who had perished there!" But mark how rapid the transition once more to beauty and fertility! On emerging from this desolation and reaching the frontier of Bokara, they had only proceeded half an hour through a country resplendent with gardens and cultivated fields when the little village of Kakemir lay before them.

Bokara (the city) is at this day the Rome of Islam. There is a small garden not far from it whose fame is widely extended; for in it stands the tomb of Baha-ed-din, the national saint of Turkistan, second in sanctity only to Mahomet. Pilgrimages are made to this tomb and garden from the most remote parts of China; and the people of Bokara go every week. About three hundred asses ply for hire between the garden and the city. It is considered a miraculous devotion in these animals that, while they go thither with the greatest alacrity, only the most determined cudgelling can turn them homeward--but then, asses may have rural proclivities.

Samarcand is the most beautiful city in Turkistan; magnificent in her splendid gardens, and in the tale of past glory told in her ruins. Two of the lofty domes which greet the eye of the stranger as he approaches are associated with Timour--the one is his mosque, the other his tomb, where the warlike Tartar rests among flowers. If we can picture the many lofty edifices with their imposing domes, and then suppose the whole intermixed with closely planted gardens, we shall have a faint idea of the loveliness in the first view of Samarcand. The way from Samarcand to Karshi, south, lies for the last two miles entirely through gardens.[52]

In Karshi is a large garden called Kalenterkhane--literally, beggar's house; but we would rather translate it pilgrim's house. The words are somewhat synonymous there, where the most saintly pilgrims to the tomb of the Prophet subsist on alms. But this is a lovely garden on the bank of the river, with walks and beds of flowers; and here the _beau monde_ of Karshi are to be seen daily from about two o'clock until past sunset. In different parts of the place the Samovins (gigantic Russian tea-kettles) are constantly occupied in furnishing their customers, gathered around them in circles two and three deep, with the national beverage, tea.

We have a slight glimpse of tropical flowers in a greenhouse, but nothing of their native beauty and abundance; for what a poor representative of its class is that dwarfed and solitary specimen, faded in color and deficient in the perfume of a hot climate! Then how can imagination fill out the entire landscape--when vines and trees cluster together, and twist their dark leaves and a thousand such blossoms into one sweet mass? Then the nard grass; and the spicy chandan, which old books say once covered the mountains of Malaya; and the groves of catalpa--not the catalpa of our latitude, but that which opens under an Indian sky, which the bee seeks before all other blossoms! The morning-glory (Ipomea) here has no fragrance, but one which grows wild in Southern Asia gives out a perfume like cloves.

One thing we remark in Asia is the quantity of flowers cultivated in cities, even the largest and most densely populated; in those of China especially, flowers are a household necessity. In most other lands--certainly in ours--they are associated with life in the country, or, at least, they are the pleasant privilege of the little village. Flowers in a city are luxuries only within reach of the wealthy. A bouquet bought in the market-place is a rare excess of floral expenditure, and it must needs be trimmed and watered until the last leaf withers. The dweller in a labyrinth of brick walls is happy if he can, one time in a year, escape to grass and gardens, and refresh memory that such things exist; but in Asiatic cities flowers are a part of life. A modern traveller says:

"After an interesting passage up the river to Canton,
the stranger enters the suburbs of the city. Here
he is surprised to see the number of flowers and
flowering-plants which everywhere meet his eyes ...
every house-window and courtyard is filled with them."

The home of Ponqua-qua, a retired Chinese merchant and mandarin, was crowded with flowers and sweet shrubs. Besides a greenhouse of choice plants, and the customary garden, his banqueting-hall opened on a grove of orange-trees and camellias, all covered with singing-birds. In years long past, the same tastes prevailed. Sir John Chardon, who was in Persia in 1686, dwells on delicious city gardens of "roses, lilies, and peach-trees." And further back still, in A.D. 1086, lived Atoz, a celebrated Chinese statesman and writer. In a description of his villa and grounds, he enumerates hedges of roses and pomegranate-trees--banks of odoriferous flowers--bamboo groves with gravel walks, willows and cedars, with the added treasure of a library of 5,000 volumes.[53]

* * * * *

In almost all pagan countries some certain flowers, either real or imaginary, receive a sort of veneration from being associated with supernatural and invisible things. Oftentimes the plant so honored is a tree, as the _Soma_ of the Hindoos (the Persian _Homa_), which was "the first tree planted by Ahura-marda by the fountain of life. He who drinks of its juice can never die." In the Hindoo _Mahabharet_, the mountain Mandar, the occasional abode of the deities, is covered with a "twining creeper;" and India boasts a vine well befitting to deck the home of the gods! It is the Bengal _banisteria_ of Linnæus, the most gigantic of all climbers. Its blossoms are pale pink shaded with red and yellow--so beautiful and so fragrant that it has gained the native name "delight of the woods." Another mountain, Meroo--a spot "beyond man's comprehension"--is adorned with trees and celestial plants of rare virtue.

The _Pelása_ (Butea frondosa) is held in great veneration; it gave name to the plain Plássey, or more properly Pelássey. It is named in the _Vedas_, in the laws of Menu, and in Sanscrit poems. Few plants (says Sir W. Jones) are considered more venerable and holy. There was a famous grove of it once at Crishnanagar.

The oriental _Nauclea_ gives an odor like wine from its gold-colored blossoms, hence it was called Halipriga, or beloved of Halin, the Bacchus of India.

The _ash-tree_ is very conspicuous in the fables of the _Edda_, and, as some part of the Scandinavian creed is said to have been carried thither from Asia, we may speak of it here. In the fifth fable of the prose _Edda_, the first man was named Aske (ash-tree), and the first woman Emla (elm-tree). We ask, Why these two especial trees? But see further--they were created by the sons of Bore from two pieces of wood found floating in the waves--and, behold, a sensible reason!

An _ash-tree_ is in the palace of the gods; it typifies the universe. Its ramifications are countless--penetrating all things--and under its branches the gods hold council. But this ash-tree in various shapes is almost the only green leaf in Scandinavian mythology. Whatever else Sigge (Odin) carried thither from Asia, he left behind the countless (and some beautiful) flower legends. Or did they die in the icy north--and in their place spring up that machinery of blood and fierce passions which made Valhalla not the flower-clad mountain of oriental climes, but a battle-ground, where life was renewed only to be again pleasurably extinguished, and where boar's meat and mead was joy sufficient?

* * * * *

Flowers seem literally to pervade almost all oriental literature, ancient and modern. They inspire kings to lay aside care and enact the poet. In the middle of the last century, one of the Chinese emperors, Kienlong, distinguished himself by a long poem, in which he painted the beauties of nature and his admiration of them. He was contemporary with Frederick the Great, who also, as his French friend sneeringly informs us, always travelled with a quire of foolscap in his pocket. On which of the monarchs the muses smiled most kindly, no Chinese critic is here to tell. See-ma-kung, a Chinese statesman, wrote a book called the _Garden_--and very many similar might be named.[54]

What can express the softer emotions of the soul as well as flowers? The oriental lover can find no sweeter name for the object of his passion than "My rosebud!" Her form is the young palm-tree, her brow the white jasmine, her curling locks sweet hyacinths; her grace is the cypress; she is a fawn among aromatic shrubs!

"Roses and lilies are like the bright cheeks of beautiful maidens,
In whose ears the pearls hang like drops of dew!"

Listen to a song from the Schar-Namah of Fedusi, one of the most celebrated Persian poets. In the original, the lines rhyme in couplets; this is only an extract. One can scarce think of the maiden as walking the earth. Surely she must have reclined on some rose, or floated round some lily!

"The air is perfumed with musk, and the waters of the
brooks, are they not the essence of roses? This jasmine
bending under the weight of its flowers, this thicket
of roses shedding its perfume, seem like the divinities
of the garden. Wherever Menisched, the daughter of
Afrariab, appears, we find men happy. It is she who
makes the garden as brilliant as the sun; the daughter
of an august monarch, is she not a new star? She is the
brilliant star that rises over the rose and jasmine.
Peerless beauty! her features are veiled, but the
elegance of her figure rivals the cypress. Her breath
spreads the perfume of amber around her; upon her cheek
reposes the rose. How languishing are her eyes! Her
lips have stolen their color from the wine, but their
odor is like the essence of roses."--_Translated from
Sismonde de Sismondi._

Nor is it only love which levies this tribute on flowers. We subjoin an extract from Mesihi, another poet whose fame is world-wide: Mesihi the irresistible!--who paints in many a lyric, with graphic touch, the fascinations of beauty, and in the concluding verse of one of them (with happy self-complacency) thus soliloquizes:

"Thou art a nightingale with a sweet voice,
O Mesihi! when thou walkest with the damsels
Whose cheeks are like roses!"

In the following subject, flowers would be expected, but in the long poem of which this is only a part they are truly--the whole:

ODE TO SPRING.

Thou hearest the song of the nightingale, that the
vernal season approaches. The spring has spread a bower
of joy in every grove; where the almond-tree sheds its
silver blossoms.

Be cheerful; be full of mirth;
For the spring soon passes away, it will not last.

The groves and hills are again adorned with all sorts
of flowers. A pavilion of roses as a seat of pleasure
is raised in the garden; who knows which of us will
live when the fair season ends?

Be cheerful; etc., etc.

Again the dew glitters on the leaves of the lily like
the water of a bright scymitar. The dew-drops fall
through the air on the garden of roses; listen to me
if thou wouldst be delighted.

Be cheerful; etc., etc.

The time is past when the plants were sick, and the
rosebud hung its head on its bosom. The season comes in
which mountains and steeps are covered with tulips.

Be cheerful; etc., etc.

Each morning the clouds shed gems over the rose
gardens. The breath of the gale is Tartarian musk. Be
not neglectful of duty through too great love of the
world.

Be cheerful; etc., etc.

_Mesihi, trans. by Sir W. Jones._

Flowers are beautiful--but such a profusion of them in print is not congenial to our northern tastes, despite other testimony in the enthusiasm of some oriental scholars. Of course, for those who are so happy as to read the originals there is a charm which is lost in translation--but there is good reason why we fail to sympathize. Hemmed in by cold and snow half the year, thought, passion, and deep feelings seek expression through channels not made of things visible; and their tides are not the less deep and strong because less demonstrative. The passionate and imaginative literature of the East is the outpourings of the soul under circumstances widely different from those under which similar effusions here (and some of the most impassioned and eloquent, too) have been penned. Each calls forth different tropes and figures--and if it is difficult for the one side to stir up imagination to untiring flights through rose-gardens, equally would the poet of Negaristan find it impossible to picture the charms of his mistress, and die of love or despair, before a coal-fire in the lamp-light.

Who can hear of roses without calling up an image of the nightingale, or, in Eastern phrase, the Bulbul? The mutual loves of the two (for roses can love there) have made the theme of tales and songs without number. Whether the story is fact or fiction--whether the bird really pours forth its most thrilling notes in the atmosphere of that perfume, may be a disputed point with "outside barbarians," but with native writers the belief is fully accepted. Here, again, the repetition is wearisome; and here, again, it is pleasant to blame--not our lack of imagination, but our peculiar surroundings; for, alas! our vault empyrean is colorless or cloudy; the melodious Bulbul a thing to dream of; and the song, generally, only a prosaic translation!

The southwestern part of Asia is the land of spices, frankincense, and myrrh. It is also the land of sweet flowers, although few modern travellers say much about them. One reason, perhaps, is that the extreme heat obliges the stranger to rest most of the day, and night is for stars, not flowers.

But who ever associates flowers with Arabia? Is it the prolonged and baleful influence of that little wood-cut map which monopolized a whole page in infantile geography--the map which presents Arabia arrayed in dots, which we were then and there informed meant desert? Or is it the omnipresent muffled figures, camels, and tents which typify Arabia in all books devoted to juveniles? Whatever the cause, Arabia and Arabians always come to mind sandy and wandering.

Not so the Arabia which Niebuhr traversed in the last part of the last century, with most ample opportunities for information.

Arabia, he writes, enjoys almost constant verdure. It is true, most of the trees shed their leaves, and annual plants wither and are reproduced; but the interval between the fall of old leaves and the reappearance of others is so short that it is scarcely observable.[55]

Here are found most of the plants of two zones. On the high lands, those of Europe and Northern or rather Middle Asia; on the plains, those of India and Africa, not precisely identical with those of Europe, but a different species or variety. Delicious and abundant also are all kinds of tropical fruits; and so plentiful the melons that they serve as food for their camels. From Arabia were also first brought many of those plants which we cultivate as curiosities rather than for beauty--the _cactus_ tribe. One of the most remarkable has its stem expanded to a globular form, about the size of a man's head; this rests on the earth, and from it proceed branches bearing flowers. In seeking for the most showy flowers, we must turn to their forest trees. Their forests are not very extensive, and such as they have are rarely seen by strangers, being quite distant from the usual course of travel. But the majestic height of the trees, covered with bright-colored and fragrant blossoms, are in marked contrast to our own forest trees, whose flowers, generally, can scarcely be distinguished from the leaves. One kind, the _keura_, is so very fragrant that a small blossom will perfume an entire apartment. Among small sweet plants is the _panicratum_, something like the sea-daffodil, of the purest white; an _hibiscus_, of the most brilliant red; and the _moscharia_, which gives from leaves and flowers the perfume of musk. But a catalogue of their names alone would exceed our limits.

"With these glorious blossoms," says Mr. Niebuhr,
"the peasantry retain the ancient custom of crowning
themselves on certain days of joy and festivity."

There is poetry in this custom. "It is said that this nation alone has produced more poets than all others united" (_Sismondi_). Arabia shares more than flowers with the rest of Asia; she, too, joins to them poetry. Her people have the same fertile imagination, aversion to the restraints of cities, love of freedom and of nature, quick feelings and ardent passions, which make the true poet. The day is past--even so long past that they have forgotten it--when all this found expression in compositions, which we read now, and marvel at their rich inventions and glowing imagery; but, nevertheless, they are poets still! A distinguished French author writes:

"Through the whole extent of the Mohammedan dominions,
in Turkey, Persia, and even to the extremity of India,
a numerous class of Arabs, both men and women, find
a livelihood in reciting these tales to crowds who
delight to forget their annoyances in the pleasing
dreams of imagination. In the coffee-houses of the
Levant, one of these men will gather a silent crowd
around him, whom he will excite, by his tale, to terror
or pity; but more frequently he will picture to his
audience those brilliant and fantastic visions which
are the patrimony of Eastern imaginations. The public
squares of cities abound with these story-tellers,
who fill up, too, the dull hours of the seraglio.
Physicians recommend them often to their patients, to
soothe pain or induce sleep; and those accustomed to
the sick modulate their voices and soften their tones
as slumber steals over the sufferer."

Seven of the most remarkable old Arabian poems, written in gold, are hung in the Caaba, or Temple, at Mecca; and the authors show themselves not in the least degree behind other orientals in heaping up flowers and metaphors.

Flowers were once held, in Arabia, of high importance in science. Next to the sciences of mathematics, they valued that of medicine; and many volumes were written on their medical plants. Somewhere about the year 941, Aben-al-Beïther made a botanical tour over Europe and Asia, and a part of Africa, and, on his return, published a volume _On the Virtues of Plants_. Still earlier than this, in 775, Al-Mansour, the second prince of the Abassides, invited a Greek physician to his court, and obtained through him translations of many learned Greek works on medicinal plants. Such are flowers in Asia.

It is no wonder that, where nature has lavished her choicest productions, and all classes delight in cultivating them, flowers have increased _ad infinitum_. No wonder their brilliant hues inspired a native poet to sing:

"A rainbow has descended on the garden."
_Mesihi._

II.

The little colony who passed from Asia to Egypt and first peopled that portion of the Mediterranean shore, in that time so long past--time without a date--must have carried with them many of their native plants; for several found indigenous only in India are found cultivated there. Among others is the Nymphæ nelumbo, the Lotus. This bore in India a sacred character; the Hindoo fable taught that the little god of love, their Cupid, was first seen floating down the Ganges on a lotus leaf. In very many ways this flower is interwoven with the Hindoo creed, or introduced in their literature--as in the following. It is part of a sublime _Hymn to Narayena_, in which that great Invisible is thus addressed:

"Omniscient spirit! whose all-ruling power
Bids from each sense bright emanations beam,
Glows in the rainbow, sparkles in the stream,
Smiles in the bud, and glistens in the flower
That crowns each vernal bower!"

--and the radiant being, dazzling and beautiful, who springs to life and typifies the material universe,

"Heavenly pensive on the lotus lay,
That blossomed at his touch, and shed a golden ray."[56]

In Egypt, when carried thither, it naturally retained a sort of sacred character. It is represented in their paintings and sculptures more frequently than any other plant; in scenes of festivity and processions, where it is twined with other flowers into wreaths and chaplets; and also in sacred scenes. Mr. Wilkinson describes a painting found at Thebes, in which is represented the final judgment of a human being:

"Osiris is seated on a throne, as judge of the dead.
He is attended by Isis and Nepthys, and before him are
the four Genii of Amenti, standing on a _Lotus_. Horus
introduces the deceased whose actions have been weighed
in the scales of Truth."

Lotus buds have been often found in the old tombs. It was also introduced into their architecture. The most favorite capital for a column was a full-blown water-plant, supposed to be the papyrus, with a bud of the same, or a lotus bud. A large variety of it called Lotomelia is cultivated there still in gardens.

Within the last few years, some information has been gathered relating to the domestic life of the early Egyptians, which was previously only conjecture. To use the words of Sir J. G. Wilkinson: "It has been drawn from a comparison of the paintings, sculptures, and monuments still existing, with the accounts of ancient authors."

On fragments of stone in different degrees of preservation, taken from the ruins of temples, tombs, and dead cities, are found representations of those who once stood here, surrounded by all the wealth and glory, the luxuries and magnificence of which this is the wreck. Cut in lines which time has not all effaced, or traced in colors which centuries have scarcely dimmed, we see here master and slave, kings, priests, and people, in all the occupations of ordinary life--a half-obliterated record of the pursuits, customs, habits, and tastes of a nation so remote that their place in the past cannot be even conjectured. We only know, from unmistakable evidence, that they came originally from Asia, and lived thus in the land of Egypt. Looking at these fragments of their skilful workmanship, thought goes back to an era almost fabulous! For who can call up even in fancy that period, when the Nile ran through its primitive landscape, and no foot of man had pressed its shore! When no cities stood in that fertile valley, and the first stone of the first pyramid was not yet laid! What a space of time must have elapsed between the first landing and the accomplishment of all these mighty labors! There is a mist over it all, gathered through uncounted centuries; and although science and research have thrown some light, it is not much more than the flickering torch with which one walks at midnight; a little is revealed near at hand, but all beyond is darkness.

Nevertheless, so much of interest is connected with Egypt that the least added knowledge is of value; for not only is it mentioned by the most ancient profane writers as mysterious in antiquity even to them, but it is the land of the Old Testament. Mounds of ruins, great in height and extent, on a branch of the Nile, yet mark the place of _Tanis_,[57] the _Zoan_ of Scripture, where, according to the Psalmist, Moses wrought those miracles which ended in the exodus of the Jews. On paintings found at Thebæ, the _No-Ammon_ of Scripture, are representations of slaves engaged in making bricks, with taskmasters superintending them; and although these may not be Jews, for brick-making was a universal menial occupation, it carries us back to the days when "bricks without straw" were demanded. The departure of the Israelites from bondage, B.C. 1491, was in the reign of Thotmes III., the Pharaoh of Scripture, which records his destruction in that day, when,

"Pharaoh went in on horseback with his chariots and
horsemen into the sea; and the Lord brought back upon
them the waters of the sea, ... neither did so much as
one of them remain, ... and they (the Israelites) saw
the Egyptians dead upon the sea-shore."

It is remarkable that a drawing found at Thebes represents his son Amenoph, who succeeded him, as coming to the throne a mere child, under the guidance of his mother. But we digress too far.

Among other things learned by patient research, we perceive the admiration of the early Egyptians for flowers, and the care with which they cultivated them. "Flowers are represented on their dresses, chairs, boxes, boats, on everything susceptible of ornamentation; and flowers and leaves are painted on the linen found preserved in the tombs" (_Wilkinson_).

Pliny, in enumerating the flowers of ancient Egypt, says the myrtle is the most odoriferous; the reason, doubtless, for its being so often placed, as now found, about the dead. At present it is only cultivated in gardens. The other plants Pliny names as indigenous are the violet, rose, myosotis, clematis, chrysanthemum, and indeed nearly the whole catalogue of a modern garden. Figures on their paintings are decked with crowns and garlands of anemone, acacia, convolvulus, and some others. In the old tombs are found date-trees, sycamores, and the tamarisk.

There is a design at Thebes which represents the funeral procession of one evidently of rank. There are cars covered with palm branches, then female mourners, other personages, and next a coffin on a sledge decked with flowers.

In another very extensive and elaborate painting a similar procession is represented as crossing the _lake of the dead_, and going from thence to the tombs. The first boat contains coffins decked with flowers; in another is a high-priest, who offers incense before a table of offerings; another boat contains female mourners, others male mourners, and others chairs, boxes, etc.

"Gardens are frequently represented in the tombs of
Thebes and other parts of Egypt, many of which are
remarkable for their extent." (_Wilkinson._)

To better understand an ancient Egyptian garden, we will first look at their dwellings. In some few cities where the size and something like a plan can be distinguished, the streets are seen, some of them wide, but more very narrow. Their houses, garden-walls, public places, all but the temples, were of brick. The plan of the houses was similar to what now prevails in warm climates; the principal apartments were ranged round a courtyard, with chambers above them. In this court were a few trees, some boxes of flowering-plants, and a reservoir of water. Their houses were generally three stories in height.

"Besides these town-houses, the wealthy Egyptians had
extensive villas, containing spacious gardens, watered
by canals communicating with the Nile. They had also
tanks of water in different parts of this garden, which
served for ornament, and also for irrigation when the
Nile was low. On these the master of the place amused
himself and friends by excursions in a pleasure-boat."

Such a scene is represented in an old painting. The company are seated in the boat under a canopy; while slaves, or at least menials, walk along the bank and drag it after them, in a way similar to our canal navigation.

"So fond were the Egyptians of trees and flowers, and
of gracing their gardens with all the profusion that
could be obtained, that they exacted a tribute of
rare productions from the nations tributary to them;
foreigners from distant countries are represented as
bearing plants, among other presents, to the Egyptian
kings."[58]

To ancient Egypt we are doubtless indebted for the invention of artificial flowers, now so prominent in female attire. They were made there first from the papyrus, the plant of which paper was made. Some old writer relates that, when Agesilaus was in Egypt, he was so charmed with a kind of crowns and chaplets which he saw in use there, formed to resemble flowers, that he carried many of them home with him to Sparta. They were perhaps imitated in Greece and became universal, yet retained the name of the inventors; for Pliny says:

"Sic coronis e floribus receptis paulo mox sabiere quæ
vocantur Ægyptiæ, ac deinde hibernæ, quum terra flores
negat, ramento e comibus tincto."--_Plin._ xxi. 3.

Everything that pictures the domestic life of this people has such great interest that it is difficult to avoid digression. Every record of it expresses wealth and their peculiar tastes. Walls are profusely covered with various designs, doors are stuccoed to imitate costly wood, and their carved chairs have furnished symmetrical copies to modern art. Interspersed with these things, we have these traces of their flowers and gardens--a story of their rural pleasures in that day of glory, when they built the pyramids--that day which has no date! The hieroglyphics carved in stone, on which they doubtless securely relied for fame and a name to the end of time, yet cover the walls still standing of their superb temples; they are traced on tombs--on urns--on the rocks which surround cities--on the sarcophagi of the dead, even on the very linen which envelopes them--but they speak in a lost language! We comprehend only one brief epitaph--that a numerous and opulent people have entirely disappeared.

In the middle ages, Egypt was still noted for flowers and valuable aromatic shrubs and herbs. Cyrene in the north part was remarkable for the beauty of its adjacent country, which even then, says a writer, bore traces of having been in former times a perfect flower-garden.

In the time of Julius Cæsar, roses must have received particular attention and extensive cultivation, for we read that a ship-load of the most fragrant was sent as a gift to Cæsar. He received them, however, with the graceless remark that he could show finer ones in Rome.

FOOTNOTES:

[49] _Diod._ ii. 13

[50] Sir W. Jones.

[51] "It is a sin to think of the future."

[52] Mr. Vambéry's _Central Asia_.

[53] _Olivier de Sèvres._ Introduction to edition of 1804

[54] See translation by Sir W. Jones. London edition, 13 vols.

[55] Niebuhr's _Arabia_, vol. ii.

[56] Translation of Sir W. Jones.

[57] Anthon's _Anc. and Mediæval_, p. 735.

[58] See illus. Lond. ed. of Sir T. G. Wilkinson's _Anc. Egyp._

THE HOUSE OF YORKE.