A thousand may be symbolized by a frond of fern, having ten or more leaves, and to this a common leaflet may be added to increase the number of thousands. In this way any given number may be represented in foliage, such as the date of a year in which a birthday, or other event, occurs, to which it is desirable to make allusion, in an emblematic wreath or floral picture. Thus, if I presented my love with a mute yet eloquent expression of good wishes on her eighteenth birthday, I should probably do it in this wise:--Within an evergreen wreath (lasting as my affection), consisting of ten leaflets and eight berries (the age of the beloved), I would place a red rose bud (pure and lovely), or a white lily (pure and modest), its spotless petals half concealing a ripe strawberry (perfect excellence); and to this I might add a blossom of the rose-scented geranium (expressive of my preference), a peach blossom to say "I am your captive" fern for sincerity, and perhaps bachelor's buttons for hope in love"--Family Friend.
There are many anecdotes and legends and classical fables to illustrate the history of shrubs and flowers, and as they add something to the peculiar interest with which we regard individual plants, they ought not to be quite passed over by the writers upon Floriculture.
THE FLOS ADONIS.
The Flos Adonis, a blood-red flower of the Anemone tribe, is one of the many plants which, according to ancient story sprang from the tears of Venus and the blood of her coy favorite.
Rose cheeked Adonis hied him to the chase
Hunting he loved, but love he laughed to scorn
Shakespeare.
Venus, the Goddess of Beauty, the mother of Love, the Queen of Laughter, the Mistress of the Graces and the Pleasures, could make no impression on the heart of the beautiful son of Myrrha, (who was changed into a myrrh tree,) though the passion-stricken charmer looked and spake with the lip and eye of the fairest of the immortals. Shakespeare, in his poem of Venus and Adonis, has done justice to her burning eloquence, and the lustre of her unequalled loveliness. She had most earnestly, and with all a true lover's care entreated Adonis to avoid the dangers of the chase, but he slighted all her warnings just as he had slighted her affections. He was killed by a wild boar. Shakespeare makes Venus thus lament over the beautiful dead body as it lay on the blood-stained grass.
Alas, poor world, what treasure hast thou lost!
What face remains alive that's worth the viewing?
Whose tongue is music now? What can'st thou boast
Of things long since, or any thing ensuing?
The flowers are sweet, their colors fresh and trim,
But true sweet beauty lived and died with him.
In her ecstacy of grief she prophecies that henceforth all sorts of sorrows shall be attendants upon love,--and alas! she was too correct an oracle.
The course of true love never does run smooth.