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Updated: June 30, 2025
According to a German belief, one who throws a rose into a grave will waste away. There is a notion prevalent in Dorsetshire that a house wherein the plant "bergamot" is kept will never be free from sickness; and in Norfolk it is said to be unlucky to take into a house a bunch of the grass called "maiden-hair," or, as it is also termed, "dudder-grass."
And on the neighboring banks the maiden-hair spread its flat disk of embroidered fronds on the wire-like stem that glistened polished and brown as the darkest tortoise-shell, and pale violets, cheated by the cold skies of their hues and perfume, sunned themselves like white-cheeked invalids.
There were some flowers on the tea-table which I admired. "Ah!" she said, with a sigh of satisfaction in their beauty; "I derive all my pleasure in life from things inanimate. An arrangement of deep-toned marigolds with brown centres in a glass like these, all aglow beneath the maiden-hair, gives me more pleasure than anything else I can think of at this moment."
One such he passed, a twister that was at least ten or eleven feet through. The trail led straight to a small dam where was the intake for the pipe that watered the vegetable garden. Here, beside the stream, were alders and laurel trees, and he walked through fern-brakes higher than his head. Velvety moss was everywhere, out of which grew maiden-hair and gold-back ferns.
And after a long time the rough rocks were decked out with soft mosses and trailing vines, and all the nooks were hung with clematis and columbine, and great elms lifted their huge tops high up into the sunlight, and down about their feet clustered the low cedars and balsams, and everywhere the violets and wind-flowers and maiden-hair grew and bloomed till the canyon became the Master's place for rest and peace and joy.
Many fine ferns dwell here also, especially the beautiful and interesting rock-ferns pellaea, and cheilanthes of several species fringing and rosetting dry rock-piles and ledges; woodwardia and asplenium on damp spots with fronds six or seven feet high; the delicate maiden-hair in mossy nooks by the falls, and the sturdy, broad-shouldered pteris covering nearly all the dry ground beneath the oaks and pines.
Following Cleo's lead the girls made their way through the thicket, and presently were in the low, soft, velvety patch, the sort of maiden-hair grass that grows under the trees. "Here we are," almost whispered Isabel, for the bird was about settled on a tuft of meadow grass. "Oh, here's Kitty!" exclaimed Grace. "Kitty girl, what are you hiding from?"
Take Rose-mary, Thyme, Sweet-bryar, Peny-royal, Bays, Water-cresses, Agrimony, Marsh-mallow-leaves and flowers, Liver-wort, Maiden-hair, Betony, Eye-bright, Scabious, the bark of an Ash-tree, young Eringo-roots, Wild-Angelica, Ribwort, Sinacle, Roman-worm-wood, Tamarisk, Mother-thyme, Saxafrage, Philipendula, of each of these herbs a like proportion; or of as many as you please to put in.
The fairy-tale went on next day, when, after wending our way through the dirty, crooked little streets, we crossed a courtyard and descended a long subterranean stairway to emerge on a magnificent terrace with a heavy marble balustrade, whence flights of steps led down to lower grades, amid statues, urns, vases, fountains, reservoirs, camellias in bloom mingled with laurel and myrtle and laurustinums covered with creamy flowers, cypresses tall as cathedral spires, ilex avenues, and broad straight walks between huge walls of box: the whole space was filled with the song of nightingales, the tinkle of falling water, with whiffs of aromatic shrubs and the breath of hidden roses and violets; a princely garden, a royal pleasaunce, but in exquisite disorder and neglect; the shrubbery too thick and straggling, the flowers straying beyond their rightful boundaries, the statues stained and moss-grown, the balusters entangled in clinging luxuriance, the fountains dripping through fern and maiden-hair Nature supreme, as one always sees her in this land of Art.
It would require an entire volume to enumerate the various uses to which these two are applied by native skill. The division of the garden called the fernery is a delightful resort, presenting a collection ranging from the low-growing maiden-hair to the tall tree-fern with broad-leaved, tufted top and declining branches.
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