"with their hues of vivid scarlet and purple! To be really appreciated,
however, they should, I think, be seen in their native home, the East.
In the neighborhood of Mount Tabor in Palestine, I have met with them
in such millions that for miles the whole plain is stained red, blue
and white, growing so thickly indeed that to walk across it without
setting foot on a flower at every step would be difficult. I believe,
and I think that this view is very generally accepted, that these are
the same lilies of the field that 'toil not neither do they spin,'
which Our Lord used to illustrate His immortal lesson. Truly Solomon in
all his glory was not arrayed like one of these."
The Adonis flower (_Flos Adonis_) spoken of by Ben Jonson and others
has nothing to do with the anemone. It is a kind of camomile. "Some
have taken the red kind to be a kind of Anemone," says Parkinson. "The
most usual name now with us is _Flos Adonis_. In English it is also
called the Mayweed and Rosarubie and Adonis Flower."
HAREBELL (_Scilla nutans_).[45] The "azured harebell," which
Shakespeare uses in "Cymbeline" for comparison with the delicate veins
of _Fidele_ (_Imogen_), has been identified as the English jacinth,
blue harebell, or hare's-bell. Browne's "Pastorals" show that this
flower was only worn by faithful lovers; and, therefore, the flower is
most appropriately selected for association with _Imogen_. Browne says:
The Harebell, for her stainless, azured hue
Claims to be worn of none but who are true.
[45] See p. 207.
This flower is also called the "wild hyacinth." Blossoming in May and
June, it is one of the precious ornaments of English woods. "Dust of
sapphire," its jewel-like flowers have been called.
"Our English jacinth, or harebells," writes Parkinson, "is so common
everywhere that it scarce needeth any description. It beareth divers
long narrow green leaves, not standing upright, not yet fully lying
on the ground, among which springeth up the stalk, bearing at the top
many long and hollow flowers, hanging down their heads, all forwards,
for the most part, parted at the brims into six parts, turning up their
points a little again, of a sweetish, but heady, scent, like unto the
Grapeflower. The heads for seed are long and square, wherein is much
black seed. The color of the flowers is in some of a deep blue tending
to purple, in others of a paler blue, or of a bleak blue tending to
an ash color. Some are pure white and some are parti-colored blue and
white; and some are of a fine delayed purplish red, or bluish color,
which some call a pearl color."
[Illustration: AN ELIZABETHAN MANOR HOUSE; HADDON HALL]
VI
_Columbine and Broom-flower_
COLUMBINE (_Aquilegia vulgaris_). "There's fennel for you, and
columbines," says _Ophelia_, as she hands the flowers to the
courtiers.[46] Shakespeare also mentions the columbine in "Love's
Labour's Lost"[47] where _Don Armado_, the "fantastical Spaniard" (a
caricature of a real person at Queen Elizabeth's court), exclaims, "I
am that flower," to which _Dumain_ and _Longueville_ reply in derision,
"That mint! That columbine!" Of the columbine of Shakespeare's time,
Parkinson says:
[46] "Hamlet"; Act IV, Scene V.
[47] Act V, Scene II.
"There be many sorts of Columbines as well differing in form as color
of the flowers, and of them, both single and double, carefully nursed
up in our gardens for the delight both of their forms and colors. The
variety of the colors of these flowers are very much, for some are
wholly white, some of a blue, or violet, color, others of a bluish,
or flesh, color, or deep, or pale, red, or of a dead purple, or dead
murrey color, as Nature listeth to show."
The generic name is derived from the word _aquila_, an eagle, because
of the fancied resemblance of some parts of the flower to the talons
of an eagle. The English name comes from the Latin _columba_, a dove,
from the likeness of its nectaries to the heads of doves in a ring
around a dish, or to the figure of a dove hovering with expanded wings
discovered by pulling off one petal with its detached sepals. Hence
this was called the dove plant. From the belief that it was the
favorite plant of the lion it was called _Herba leonis_.
The columbine was valued for many medicinal virtues.
"The scarlet and yellow columbine," writes Matthew, "is one of our
most beautiful wild flowers. It is my experience that certain flowers
have certain favorite haunts, which are exclusively held by them year
after year. This flower is in its prime about the first of June, and is
nearly always found beside some lichen-covered rock."
The English and American flowers differ, although the early colonists
brought the English flower with them. Grant Allen tells us:
"The English columbine is a more developed type than the American
scarlet, is never yellow in the wild state, but often purple, and,
sometimes, blue. Larkspur, ranking still higher in the floral scale,
in virtue of its singular bilateral blossoms, is usually blue, though
it sometimes reverts to reddish-purple, or white; while monkshood,
the very top of the tree on this line of development, is usually deep
ultramarine, only a few species being prettily variegated with pale
blue and white. As a rule, blue flowers are the very highest; and the
reason seems to lie in the strange fact, first discovered by Sir John
Lubbock, that bees are fonder of blue than of any other color. Still,
they are fond enough even of red; and one may be sure that the change
from yellow to scarlet in the petals of the American columbine is due
in one way or another to the selective tastes and preferences of the
higher insects."
The colors of the American columbine are dark opaque blues, smoky
purples, dull pinks, pale blues, lavenders, reds and yellows--an
infinite variety!
"The flowering of the 'Columbine Commendable,' as Skelton called it
four hundred years ago," says Harriet L. Keeler, "marks the beginning
of summer. The reign of the bulbs is over;
The windflower and the violet
They perished long ago;
the petals of the early roses are falling; the elder-blossoms show
white along the fence rows; and the season waxes to its prime.
"A wild flower of English fields, the columbine was early transferred
into English gardens and has held its place securely there for at least
five hundred years. Its seeds were among the treasures borne over the
sea to the New World and it early bloomed in Pilgrim gardens. This
primitive stock still persists in cultivation.
"The flower of the columbine is a unique and interesting form. The
sepals look like petals and the petals are veritable horns of plenty
filled with nectar at the closed ends for the swarms of bees which
gather about. The sweets are produced by the blossoms on a generous
scale, and to a columbine bed in full bloom the bees come, big and
little, noisy and silent--all giddy with the feast. There is no use
trying to drive them away for they will not go. Clumsy bumble bees with
tongues long enough to reach the honey by the open door, wise honey
bees who have learned to take the short road to the nectar by biting
through the spur, quiet brown bees, little green carpenters--all are
there, 'vehement, voluble, velvety,' in a glorious riot of happiness
and honey.
"The doubling occurs chiefly with the petals; the sepals, as a rule,
hold true to the five, but the petals sometimes double in number,
becoming ten spurs in place of five, and each spur becomes a nest of
spurs like a set of Chinese cups, though the innermost are frequently
imperfect."
The columbine frequently appears in the paintings of the Great Masters.
Luini has immortalized it in his picture of this title now in the
gallery of the Hermitage at Petrograd. A fascinating woman with a
smile as enchanting--if not so famous--as Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona
Lisa" holds an exquisitely painted columbine in her left hand and gazes
at it with tender, loving emotion.
The early Italian and Flemish painters include the columbine with the
rose, lily, pink, violet, strawberry, and clover in the gardens where
the Madonna sits with the Holy Child. The reason that the columbine was
chosen as a flower of religious symbolism was because of the little
doves formed by the five petals. The columbine signified the "Seven
Gifts of the Holy Spirit," and the Flemish painters in their zeal for
accuracy corrected the number of petals to seven to make the flower
agree with the teaching of the Church.
Yet although the columbine has these religious associations, we always
think of it as an airy, piquant flower, the gay and irresponsible
dancer of the rocks and dells, clad, as it were, in fantastic and
parti-colored dress. Graceful in form and charming in color, put
together with extreme delicacy on slender, flexible, fragile stems
and adorned with a leaf approaching that of the fern in delicacy and
lace-like beauty, the columbine is one of the most delightful of
flowers. Always associated with folly, we love it none the less for
that, for there are times when we enjoy _Harlequin_ and _Columbine_
among our flowers,--and these fantastic and frivolous columbines
dancing so gaily in the breeze always fill us with delight.
BROOM (_Cytisus scoparius_). Although the broom was a popular plant
in Elizabethan days it is only mentioned once by Shakespeare. In "The
Tempest,"[48] where _Iris_ in the mask in her apostrophe to "Ceres,
most bounteous lady," speaks of
thy broom-groves
Whose shadow the dismissed bachelor loves,
Being lass-lorn ...
... the queen o' the sky ...
Bids thee leave these.
[48] Act IV, Scene I.
When in blossom the broom is lovely to look upon. The large yellow
flowers are gracefully arranged on the branches, and its perfume is
delightful.
"Sweet is the Broome-flower!" exclaims Spenser. The broom is the
_Planta genesta_, from which the Plantagenets took their name. The
flower, having become heraldic during that dynasty, was embroidered on
the clothes of the Plantagenet family and imitated in their jewels.
When they died it was carved on their monuments. The story goes that
Geoffrey, Earl of Anjou, father of Henry II of England, once on his
way to a field of battle, had to climb a rocky path, and he noticed
as he went along the bushes of yellow broom clinging to the rocks.
Breaking off a branch he, placed it in his helmet with the words: "This
golden plant shall be my emblem henceforth. Rooted firmly among rocks
and upholding that which is ready to fall." His son, Henry, was called
"the royal sprig of Genesta." The golden plume of broom-flowers was
worn by the Plantagenets until the last one of the line, Richard III,
lost the Crown of England to Henry VII, the first of the Tudors.
In 1264 the _Planta genesta_ was honored by St. Louis, who instituted
the Order of Genest on his marriage with Marguerite. The Knights of
the Genest wore chains made of the broom-flower alternating with the
fleur-de-lis. Shakespeare speaks of a "broom-staff" and sends _Puck_
with broom before
To sweep the dust behind the door.
Whether _Puck's_ broom was made from the _Genesta_ or not we do not
know; but we do know that the broom, in common with other briars, was
used to make besoms for sweeping and also for staffs to walk with and
to lean upon.
[Illustration: ROSE ARBOR, WARLEY, ENGLAND]
Summer
"SWEET SUMMER BUDS"
I
"_Morning Roses Newly Washed with Dew_"
THE ROSE (_Rosa_). Shakespeare speaks of the rose more frequently than
any other flower. Sixty references to the rose are scattered through
his works. Sometimes he talks of the rose itself and sometimes he uses
the word to make a striking comparison, or analogy. With magical touch
he gives us the bold picture of a
Red rose on triumphant briar,
then he brings before us a delicious whiff of the
Perfumèd tincture of the roses,
or the luscious fragrance of
Morning roses newly washed with dew.
With equal delicacy of perception he tells us
So sweet a kiss the golden sun gives not
To those fresh morning drops upon the rose.[49]
Shakespeare's special roses are the Red, the White, the Musk, the
Eglantine (sweetbrier), the Provençal, or Provins, the Damask, the
Canker, and the Variegated.
[49] "Love's Labour's Lost"; Act IV, Scene III.
THE RED ROSE (_Rose Anglica rubra_), the English red, is thus described
by Parkinson:
"The Red Rose, which I call English because this rose is more frequent
and used in England than in other places, never groweth so high as the
Damask Rose-bush, but more usually abideth low and shooteth forth many
branches from the Rose-bush (and is but seldom suffered to grow up as
the Damask Rose into standards) with a green bark thinner set with
prickles and longer and greener leaves on the upper side than in the
white, yet with an eye of white upon them, five likewise most usually
set upon a stalk and grayish, or whitish, underneath. The Roses, or
flowers, do very much vary according to their site and abiding, for
some are of an orient red, or deep crimson, color and very double
(although never so double as the White), which, when it is full blown,
hath the largest leaves of any other Rose; some of them again are
paler, tending somewhat to a Damask; and some are of so pale a red as
that it is rather of the color of a Canker Rose, yet all for the most
part with larger leaves than the Damask, and with many more yellow
threads in the middle. The scent hereof is much better than in the
White, but not comparable to the excellency of the Damask Rose, yet
this Rose, being well dried and well kept, will hold both color and
scent longer than the Damask."
THE WHITE ROSE (_Rosa Anglica alba_).
"The White Rose is of two kinds," says Parkinson, "the one more thick
and double than the other. The one riseth up in some shadowy places
unto eight or ten foot high, with a stock of great bigness for a rose.
The other growing seldom higher than a Damask Rose. Both these Roses
have somewhat smaller and whiter green leaves than in many other Roses,
five most usually set on a stock and more white underneath, as also a
whiter green bark, armed with sharp thorns, or prickles. The flowers
in the one are whitish with an eye, or shew, of a blush, especially
towards the ground, or bottom, of the flower, very thick, double and
close set together; and, for the most part, not opening itself so
largely and fully as either the Red, or Damask Rose. The other more
white, less thick and double and opening itself more, and some so
little double (as but of two or three rows) that they might be held to
be single, yet all of little or no smell at all."
From this _Rosa alba_, Pliny says, the isle of Albion derived its
name--a happy thought when we remember that the rose is still the
national emblem of England.
MUSK-ROSE (_Rosa moschata_). Musk-roses and eglantine mingled with
honeysuckle formed the canopy beneath which _Titania_ slumbered on a
bank made soft and lovely with wild thyme, oxlips and nodding violets.
And in the "coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers" that the dainty
little fairy queen placed upon the hairy temples of _Bottom_ the
Weaver, musk-roses were conspicuous; and the sweetness of these was
intensified by "the round and Orient pearls of dew" that swelled upon
the petals, as the "pretty flowerets bewailed their own disgrace."
It is this delicious rose which Keats, when listening to the
nightingale, sensed rather than visualized in the twilight dimness:
The coming musk-rose full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.
The musk-rose was adored by the Elizabethans. Lord Bacon considered its
scent to come next to that of the violet, and before all other flowers.
"You remember the great bush at the corner of the south wall just by
the Blue Drawing-room window?" writes Mrs. Gaskell in "My Lady Ludlow."
"That is the old musk-rose, Shakespeare's musk-rose, which is dying out
through the kingdom now. The scent is unlike the scent of any other
rose, or of any other flower."
The musk-rose is a native of North Africa, Spain, and India (Nepal).
Hakluyt in 1582 gave the date of its introduction into England. "The
turkey-cocks and hens," he says, "were brought in about fifty years
past; the Artichoke in the time of Henry the Eighth; and of later times
was procured out of Italy the Musk Rose plant and the Plum called
Perdigwena."
Turning now to Parkinson and opening his big volume at the page "_Rosa
Moschata_, simple and multiplex," we read:
"The Musk Rose, both single and double, rises up oftentimes to a very
great height that it overgroweth any arbor in a Garden, or being set
by a house side to be ten or twelve foot high, or more, but especially
the single kind with many green far spread branches armed with a few
sharp great thorns, as the wilder sorts of Roses are, whereof these
are accounted to be kinds, having small dark green leaves on them, not
much bigger than the leaves of Eglantines. The Flowers come forth at
the tops of the branches, many together as it were in an umbel, or
tuft, which, for the most part, do flower all at a time, or not long
one after another, every one standing on a pretty long stalk and are
of a pale whitish, or cream color, both the single and the double, the
single being small flowers consisting of five leaves with many yellow
threads in the middle; and the double bearing more double flowers, as
if they were once or twice more double than the single, with yellow
thrums also in the middle, both of them of a very sweet and pleasing
smell, resembling musk. Some there be that have avouched that the chief
scent of these Roses consisteth not in the leaves but in the threads of
the Flowers."
The color of the musk-rose is white, slightly tinged with pink.
EGLANTINE; ALSO SWEETBRIER (_Rosa eglanteria_). This is a conspicuous
adornment of _Titania's_ bower, and is as remarkable for its beauty as
for its scent. The pink flowers with their golden threads in the center
are familiar to every one.
"The Sweet Briar, or Eglantine," Parkinson writes, "is not only planted
in Gardens for the sweetness of its leaves, but growing wild in many
woods and hedges, hath exceeding long green shoots armed with the
cruellest sharp and strong thorns and thicker set than is in any Rose,
either Wild or tame. The leaves are smaller than in most of those that
are nourished up in Gardens, seven or nine, most usually set together
on a rib, or stalk, very green and sweeter in smell about the leaves of
any other kind of Rose. The flowers are small, single, blush Roses."
PROVENÇAL, OR PROVINS (_Centifolia_). This old-fashioned cabbage-rose
of globular flowers, massive foliage, hard knob of leaves in the
center, and sweet perfume is affectionately known as the "Hundred
Leaf," or _rose à cent feuilles_. Parkinson gives two varieties: the
incarnate, or flesh-color; and the red.
In our country the light pink, or incarnate, is the more familiar. What
associations does it not conjure up? To many of us Dean Hole's words
make a touching appeal:
"The blushing, fresh, fragrant Provence! It was to many of us _the_
Rose of our childhood and its delicious perfume passes through the
outer sense into our hearts gladdening them with bright and happy
dreams, saddening them with love and child awakenings. It brings more
to us than the fairness and sweet smell of a Rose. We passed in our
play to gaze on it with the touch of a vanished hand in ours, with
a father's blessing on our heads and a mother's prayer that we might
never lose our love of the beautiful. Happy they who return, or regain,
that love."
THE DAMASK ROSE (_Rosa damascena_) is a native of Syria, whence it was
brought to Europe about 1270 by Thibault IV, Comte de Brie, returning
from the Holy Land. We know exactly when it was introduced into England
because Hakluyt, writing in 1582, says: "In time of memory many things
have been brought in that were not here before, as the Damask Rose by
Doctor Liniker, King Henry the Seventh and King Henry the Eighth's
physician."
"Gloves as sweet as Damask Roses" _Autolycus_ carries in his peddler's
pack for "lads to give their dears," along with masks for their faces,
perfume, necklace-amber, pins, quoifs, and "lawn as white as driven
snow."[50]
[50] "The Winter's Tale"; Act IV, Scene III.
Parkinson informs us:
"The Damask Rose-bush is more usually nourished up to a competent
height to stand alone (which we call Standards), than any other Rose.
The bark, both of the stock and branches, is not fully so green as the
Red or White Rose. The leaves are green with an eye of white upon
them. The flowers are of a fine deep blush color, as all know, with
some pale yellow threads in the middle, and are not so thick and double
as the White, not being blown with so large and great leaves as the
Red, but of the most excellent sweet pleasant scent, far surpassing
all other Roses or Flowers, being neither heady, nor too strong, nor
stuffing or unpleasant sweet, as many other flowers.
"The Rose is of exceeding great use with us, for the Damask Rose
(besides the superexcellent sweet water it yieldeth, being distilled,
or the perfume of its leaves, being dried, serving to fill sweet
bags) serveth to cause solubleness of the body, made into a syrup, or
preserved with sugar, moist or candied." The name is obviously from
Damascus.
CANKER (_Rosa canina_). This is the wild dog-rose common to many
countries. The name dog-rose was given to it by the Romans, because the
root was said to cure the bite of a mad dog. Pliny says the remedy was
discovered in a dream by the mother of a soldier who had been bitten by
a mad dog. _Don Juan's_ remark in "Much Ado About Nothing."[51]
I had rather be a canker in the hedge
Than a rose in his garden,
refers, of course, to the canker-rose. According to legend, the Crown of
Thorns was made from the briers of this variety of rose.
[51] Act I, Scene III.
VARIEGATED ROSE (_Rosa versicolor_) of Shakespeare's plays is the
curious bush which produces at the same time red roses, white roses,
and roses of red mottled with white and of white mottled with red. The
growth of the tree is stiff and erect and the flowers have a sweet
scent. The rose is often called the "York and Lancaster." Parkinson
says:
"This Rose in the form and order of the growing is nearest unto the
ordinary Damask Rose both for stem, branch, leaf and flower, the
difference consisting in this--that the flower (being of the same
largeness and doubleness as the Damask Rose) hath the one half of it
sometimes of a pale whitish color and the other half of a paler damask
color than the ordinary. This happeneth so many times, and sometimes
also the flower hath divers stripes and marks on it, one leaf white, or
striped with white, and the other half blush, or striped with blush,
sometimes all striped, or spotted over, and at other times little or no
stripes, or marks, at all, as Nature listeth to play with varieties in
this as in other flowers. Yet this I have observed, that the longer it
abideth blown open to the sun, the paler and the fewer stripes, marks,
or spots will be seen in it. The smell is of a weak Damask Rose scent."
This rose recalls the old song of a "Lover to His Lancastrian
Mistress," on handing her a white rose:
If this fair rose offend thy sight,
Placed in thy bosom bare,
'T will blush to find itself less white,
And turn Lancastrian there,
But if thy ruby lip it spy,
As kiss it thou mayst deign,
With envy pale 'twill lose its dye,
And Yorkish turn again.
In his play of "King Henry VI," which passes during the Wars of the
Roses, Shakespeare introduces the noted scene in the Temple Garden,
London, where the emblem of the Yorkists (a white rose) and that of
the Lancastrians (a red rose) is chosen. Richard Plantagenet plucks a
white rose and the Earl of Somerset a red rose from rose-bushes that
are still growing and blooming in the same spot, as they did when
Shakespeare imagined the scene in "King Henry VI."[52]
[52] Part I, Act II, Scene IV.
In Shakespeare's day the rose was enormously cultivated. In the gardens
of Ely Place, the home of Queen Elizabeth's dashing lord chancellor,
twenty bushels of roses were gathered annually--a good deal for the
time.