The Folk-lore of Plants

"Marigold, that goes to bed with the sun, And with him rises weeping." And Moore, describing its faithful constancy, says:-- "The sunflower turns on her god when he sets The same look which she did when he rose." Such a flower, writes Mr. Ellacombe, was to old writers "the emblem of constancy in affection and sympathy in joy and sorrow," though it was also the emblem of the fawning courtier, who can only shine when everything is right. Anyhow, the so-called heliotrope was the subject of constant symbolic allusion:-- "The flower, enamoured of the sun, At his departure hangs her head and weeps, And shrouds her sweetness up, and keeps Sad vigils, like a cloistered nun, Till his reviving ray appears, Waking her beauty as he dries her tears."[5] The aspen, from its tremulous motion, has been made symbolical of fear. The restless movement of its leaves is "produced by the peculiar form of the foot-stalks, and, indeed, in some degree, the whole tribe of poplars are subject to have their leaves agitated by the slightest breeze."[6] Another meaning assigned to the aspen in floral language is scandal, from an old saying which affirmed that its tears were made from women's tongues--an allusion to which is made in the subjoined rhyme by P. Hannay in the year 1622:-- "The quaking aspen, light and thin, To the air quick passage gives; Resembling still The trembling ill Of tongues of womankind, Which never rest, But still are prest To wave with every wind."