| 词汇 | jasmine |
| 词源 | jasmine. The jasmine vine with its fragrant flowers is native to Eurasia and Africa and was introduced into England in 1548. It takes its name from the Persian yasmin for the plant. Accord- ing to a legend recounted in the rare 18th-century book The Sentiment of Flowers: This beautiful plant grew in Hampton Court garden [En- gland] at the end of the 17th century; but, being lost there, was known only in Europe in the garden of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, at Pisa. From a jealous and selfish anxiety that he should continue to be the sole possessor of a plant so charming and rare, he [the duke] strictly charged his gardener not to give a single sprig, or even a flower, to any person. The gardener might have been faithful if he had not loved; but being attached to a fair, though portionless damsel, he presented her with a bouquet on her birthday; and in order to render it more acceptable, ornamented it with a sprig of jasmine. The young maiden, to preserve the freshness of this pretty stranger, placed it in the earth, where it remained green until the return of spring, when it budded forth and was covered with flowers. She had profited by her lover’s lessons, and now cultivated her highly prized jasmine with care, for which she was amply rewarded by its rapid growth. The poverty of the lovers had been a bar to their union; now, however, she had amassed a little fortune by the sale of the cuttings from the plant which love had given her, and bestowed it, with her hand, upon the gardener of her heart. The young girls of Tuscany, in remembrance of this adventure, always deck themselves, on their wedding day, with a nosegay of jasmine; and they have a proverb: “she who is worthy to wear a nosegay of jasmine is as good as a fortune to her husband.” |
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