Myrtle

“ The myrtle (ensign of supreme command,
Consign'd by Venus to Melissa's hand)
Not less capricious than a reigning fair,
Oft favours, oft rejects, a lover's pray'r.
In myrtle shades oft sings the happy swain,
In myrtle shades despairing ghosts complain. ”

“ The myrtle dwells there, sending round the richness of its breath,
And the violets gleam, like amethysts, in the dewy moss beneath!
"And there are floating sounds that fill the skies through night and day,
Sweet sounds! the soul to hear them faints in dreams of heaven away! ”

“ I think I can guess, Myrtle, that we have a little plan of some kind or other. We don't visit Papa Job quite so early as this without some special cause,—do we, Miss Keren-Happuch?”
“I want to go to the city—to school,” Myrtle said, with the directness which belonged to her nature.
“That is precisely what I want you to do myself, Miss Myrtle Hazard. I don't like to lose you from the village, but I think we must spare you for a while.”
“You're the best and dearest man that ever lived. What could have made you think of such a thing for me, Mr. Gridley?” ”

“ He had no objection to have Gifted Hopkins about Myrtle as much as she would endure to have him. The youthful bard entertained her very innocently with his bursts of poetry, but she was in no danger from a young person so intimately associated with the yard-stick, the blunt scissors, and the brown-paper parcel. There was Cyprian too, about whom he did not feel any very particular solicitude. Myrtle had evidently found out that she was handsome and stylish and all that, and it was not very likely she would take up with such a bashful, humble, country youth as this. ”

“ SIR F. Is that all?
ARTH. All! It strikes me as being quite enough. No, it isn’t all—it’s only half, for Myrtle—
SIR F. (cutting him short) . Never mind Myrtle; I know all about her. She thinks you a bit of a milksop—s—so do I; that you’ve no energy—not an atom! no will of your own—never had! and that in order to reinstate yourself in her good opinion you must do something desperate! So you shall! Now what do you mean to do?
ARTH. Show a proper spirit, and—run away!
SIR F. Run away! Certainly not—fling yourself into my arms and I’ll pull you through! So cheer up! ”

“ One witness looked on with unmoved features, yet Myrtle thought there was a more heavenly smile on her faded lips than she had ever seen before beaming from the canvas,—it was Ann Holyoake, the martyr to her faith, the guardian spirit of Myrtle's visions, who seemed to breathe a holier benediction than any words—even those of the good old Father Pemberton himself—could convey. ”

“ Not even a flower! But, Myrtle,” she cried, “we will plant flowers! and they will grow! And we will gather such sweet nosegays! Nosegays and garlands for everybody! for all love flowers. Flowers such as I plucked in my own garden. Bright, blooming, fragrant flowers!” she continued, mournfully, her voice growing every moment fainter and more sorrowful. Myrtle feared she was going to cry, and so made haste to answer.
[80] “But we have no seeds. And, besides, winter is coming; flowers die in the winter.”
“True,” said Rosebud; “we will wait till spring. ”

“ Though a most abundant shrub in the South of Europe, and probably introduced into England before the time of Shakespeare, the myrtle was only grown in a very few places, and was kept alive with difficulty, so that it was looked upon not only as a delicate and an elegant rarity, but as the established emblem of refined beauty. ”

“ I want David, terribly," she said, sitting erect with shut hands; "and I will be expected to step aside, to keep out of the way while Myrtle poses at him. Oh, I know all about it. I see her rehearsing before the glass. Or I will be expected to act as a contrast, a plain background, for Myrtle's beauty.
"You see, there is no one I can talk to but yourself. Even mother wouldn't understand, completely; and she couldn't be honest about Myrtle. The best of mothers, after all, are women; and, Howat, there is always a curious formality between women, a little stiffness." ”

“ Myrtle was a child of nature, and of course, according to the out-worn formulae which still shame the distorted religion of humanity, hateful to the Father in Heaven who made her. She had grown up in antagonism with all that surrounded her. ”

“ Miss Cynthia, a sharper-edged woman, had formed the habit of crushing everything for its moral, until it lost its sweetness and grew almost odious, as flower-de-luces do when handled roughly. “There's a worm in that leaf, Myrtle. He has rolled it all round him, and hidden himself from sight; but there is a horrid worm in it, for all it is so young and fresh. There is a worm in every young soul, Myrtle.” ”

“ Suddenly they paused and fell upon their knees in the road, while a man’s voice wailed out a prayer. Time was when Myrtle Street gibed at the Salvationists and threw rocks at them and hustled them about. But that was when the red shirts and the flapping banner were something new. The newness was gone now, and Myrtle Street merely shuffled indifferently past, and the beat of the big drum, the strident voices of the exhorters were quite as much a part of the night sounds of the place as the bawling of the showman or the chatter of the frowsy girls. ”

“ As a garden shrub every one will grow the Myrtle that can induce it to grow. There is no difficulty in its cultivation, provided only that the climate suits it, and the climate that suits it best is the neighbourhood of the sea. Virgil describes the Myrtles as "amantes littora myrtos," and those who have seen the Myrtle as it grows on the Devonshire and Cornish coasts will recognise the truth of his description.
FOOTNOTES:
[174:1] "Gayle; mirtus."—Catholicon Anglicum, p. 147, with note.
NARCISSUS. See Daffodils, p. 73.
NETTLES.
The Nettle needs no introduction ”

“ Now, being a Wizard, he knew how powerful fashion is in this world, and how a wandering breath may bring it into being, so he said to himself: "I will go direct to the court of the Princess Myrtle, who has married the Prince Merlin, and will gain her ear. When she knows the invisible wall is to protect her kingdom, she will be gracious and set the fashion of providing stones." ”

“ Cast thy eyes round about, and look whether there be any one stem of a flower, any twig of a Tree broken; whether any of thy fruits be pull'd, or any flower trodden down; whether any fountain be troubled, and mudded; and thou (Philetas) of all mortals, rejoyce alone in thy old age. This said, the sweet boy sprung into the myrtle grove, and like a Nightingale, from bough to bough, under the green leaves, skipt to the top, and highest story of the Myrtles. ”

“ The Myrtle has ever been consecrated to Venus. At Rome, the temple of the goddess was surrounded by a grove of Myrtles; and in Greece, she was adorned under the name of Myrtilla. It was observed by the ancients, that, wherever the Myrtle grew, it excluded all other plants. So love, wherever it is permitted to grow, excludes all other feelings. The ladies of modern Rome retain a strong affection for this plant, preferring its odour to that of the most fragrant essences.
Our love came as the early dew
Comes unto drooping flowers ”

“ The whisper continued: "They tell me your mamma's in the cem'tery, Myrtle. I've come home to lay alongside of her. I'm grain for the grim reaper's sickle. In death we sha'n't be divided; and I've walked half the way from Texas. Don't expect you'd want to kiss me. You look awful like her, Myrtle."
Tears rolled out of his eyes down his hollowed cheeks, which seemed almost black between the high bones. His pointed chin quivered. He made a wavering gesture of both hands and sat down on the floor. Behind Mrs. Egg the cook sobbed aloud. A farmhand stood on the grass by the outer steps, looking in. ”

“ Now Mistress Kitty Fagan was devoted, heart and soul, to Myrtle Hazard, and ever since she had received the young girl from Mr. Gridley's hands, when he brought her back safe and sound after her memorable adventure, had considered him as Myrtle's best friend and natural protector. These simple creatures, whose thoughts are not taken up, like those of educated people, with the care of a great museum of dead phrases, are very quick to see the live facts which are going on about them. ”

“ Each myrtle is loaded with them, and they emit perfumes more exquisite than those of the rose itself. They enchant every one, and the soul is filled with the softest sensations.” The myrtle is mentioned in Scripture among lofty trees, not as comparing with them in size, but as contributing with them to the beauty and richness of the scenery. Thus Isaiah, xii, 19, intending to describe a scene of varied excellence: I will plant in the wilderness the cedar, and the shittah tree, and the myrtle, and the oil tree ”

“ Pathos is not sadness, but it is rather the sunshine gleaming through a passing cloud, and hence the writings of Myrtle Reed are illumined with the gladsome light of unfailing love. Not only in her books and in letters to troubled souls, but also in her personal records, we find the unfading lines of a deeply devotional nature which was sacredly guarded from the careless observer and seldom discussed even with friends. ”

“ In the mean time Myrtle seemed to be showing some new developments. One would have said that the instincts of the coquette, or at least of the city belle, were coming uppermost in her nature. Her little nervous attack passed away, and she gained strength and beauty every day. She was becoming conscious of her gifts of fascination, and seemed to please herself with the homage of her rustic admirers. Why was it that no one of them had the look and bearing of that young man she had seen but a moment the other evening? To think that he should have taken up with such a weakling as Susan Posey! ”

“ And if it could be that, after so many generations, the blood of her who had died for her faith could show in her descendants veins, and the soul of that elect lady of her race look out from her far-removed offspring's dark eyes, such a transfusion of the martyr's life and spiritual being might well seem to manifest itself in Myrtle Hazard.
The large-hearted old man forgot his scholastic theory of human nature as he looked upon her face. He thought he saw in her the dawning of that grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach through many trials and dangers ”

“ He had followed Myrtle through her whole career, if not as her avowed lover, at least as one whose friendship promised to flower in love in due season. The moment had come when the scene and the characters in this village drama were to undergo a change as sudden and as brilliant as is seen in those fairy spectacles where the dark background changes to a golden palace and the sober dresses are replaced by robes of regal splendor. ”

“ King Cuthbert could not believe his ears, nor trust his eyes, for the Princess Myrtle had great vaults of gold under the thousand-year-old turrets of her castle; and pearls like pigeon eggs in the renowned diadem with which the generations of her royal race were crowned kings or queens.
"My uncle sends me as a beggar-maid so that I can make a true marriage. I desire to be loved for myself alone. Speak not of me to the court, but deal with me as I appear to be." ”

“ The thistle and the wild myrtle shake their heads in the winds, and utter their low monody which mingles with, and is swelled by the voice of the Cona, all seeming to mourn over crime, and to pronounce for doom. ”

“ The Debutante's name was Myrtle. Her Parents were very Watchful, and did not encourage her to receive Callers, except such as were known to be Exemplary Young Men. Fred and Eustace were a few of those who escaped the Black List. Myrtle always appeared to be glad to see them, and they regarded her as a Darned Swell Girl.
MYRTLE
Fred's Cousin came from St. Paul on a Visit; and one Day, in the Street, he saw Myrtle, and noticed that Fred tipped his Hat, and gave her a Stage Smile. ”

“ That is why in these countries, we ab initio use these myrtles that are imported and do not have three leaves from one node. There is one who says that our myrtles are not considered wild myrtle because they are two by two and are not like the wild myrtle in the Gemara. ”

“ But her eyes were all for Prince Merlin, who, when the courtiers crowded about her and proclaimed her a princess, looked straight away from her. This was as a little sword in her heart, but the grief that dimmed her eyes made her appear even more beautiful.
After the banquet all proceeded to the dancing-hall, and King Cuthbert gave his arm to her. "Now I know thou art the Princess Myrtle. Which of my sons hast thou chosen?"
"A woman is chosen; she does not choose," she replied, for her heart was heavy. "To-night I must leave your court." ”

“ Instead of the claw-feet common in furniture of a later date, each of its legs rested on a misshapen reptile, which it seemed to flatten by its weight, as if it were squeezing the breath out of the ugly creature. Over this chair hung the portrait of her beautiful ancestress, her neck and arms, the specialty of her beauty, bare, except for a bracelet on the left wrist, and her shapely figure set off by the ample folds of a rich crimson brocade. Over Myrtle's bed hung that other portrait, which was to her almost as the pictures of the Mater Dolorosa to trustful souls of the Roman faith. ”