Here is Shakespeare's version of the metamorphosis of Adonis into a flower.
By this the boy that by her side lay killed
Was melted into vapour from her sight,
And in his blood that on the ground lay spilled,
A purple flower sprang up, checquered with white,
Resembling well his pale cheeks, and the blood
Which in round drops upon their whiteness stood.
She bows her head, the new sprung flower to smell,
Comparing it to her Adonis' breath,
And says, within her bosom it shall dwell
Since he himself is reft from her by death;
She crops the stalk, and in the branch appears
Green dropping sap which she compares to tears.
The reader may like to contrast this account of the change from human into floral beauty with the version of the same story in Ovid as translated by Eusden.
Then on the blood sweet nectar she bestows,
The scented blood in little bubbles rose;
Little as rainy drops, which fluttering fly,
Borne by the winds, along a lowering sky,
Short time ensued, till where the blood was shed,
A flower began to rear its purple head
Such, as on Punic apples is revealed
Or in the filmy rind but half concealed,
Still here the fate of lonely forms we see,
So sudden fades the sweet Anemone.
The feeble stems to stormy blasts a prey
Their sickly beauties droop, and pine away
The winds forbid the flowers to flourish long
Which owe to winds their names in Grecian song.
The concluding couplet alludes to the Grecian name of the flower ([Greek: anemos], anemos, the wind.)
It is said of the Anemone that it never opens its lips until Zephyr kisses them. Sir William Jones alludes to its short-lived beauty.
Youth, like a thin anemone, displays
His silken leaf, and in a morn decays.
Horace Smith speaks of
The coy anemone that ne'er discloses
Her lips until they're blown on by the wind
Plants open out their leaves to breathe the air just as eagerly as they throw down their roots to suck up the moisture of the earth. Dr. Linley, indeed says, "they feed more by their leaves than their roots." I lately met with a curious illustration of the fact that plants draw a larger proportion of their nourishment from light and air than is commonly supposed. I had a beautiful convolvulus growing upon a trellis work in an upper verandah with a south-western aspect. The root of the plant was in pots. The convolvulus growing too luxuriantly and encroaching too much upon the space devoted to a creeper of another kind, I separated its upper branches from the root and left them to die. The leaves began to fade the second day and most of them were quite dead the third or fourth day, but two or three of the smallest retained a sickly life for some days more. The buds or rather chalices outlived the leaves. The chalices continued to expand every morning, for--I am afraid to say how long a time--it might seem perfectly incredible. The convolvulus is a plant of a rather delicate character and I was perfectly astonished at its tenacity of life in this case. I should mention that this happened in the rainy season and that the upper part of the creeper was partially protected from the sun.