SWEET MIGNONETTE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 October 1938, Page 10

SWEET MIGNONETTE

SENTIMENT AND CHARM. Sentiment and charm are bound up in sweet mignonette, which is one of* the oldest flowers in the garden—a true conservative. Its original home seems to have been Egypt, though other countries produce a wild variety which however, has not always its sweet perfume. No doubt Cleopatra knew it in her gay Alexandrian gardens, where it flourished along with the lotus and the rose. It was first called the Egyptian rocket when it came over to England from Holland in the eighteenth century, though it got its name, meaning “little dear one,” in France. It has been loved and cherished by rich and poor, high and low for thousands of years. Today sophisticated young moderns as well as sentimental elders still find a corner for it somewhere —a pot, window-box, bed, or border. It is all the same to this well-loved plant, which is of all flowers the most faithful. It only asks to be sown and left alone, for like all conservatives it eschews transplanting. It will be found blooming, as it was in the recent flower shortage, when all other flowers are absent. Cut, it will remain fresh and retain its sweetness longer than any of its scented sisters. A pretty story relates to its secret meaning in old, sentimental flowerbooks —a story of love, romance, and charm. A certain Count of Saxony was once spending an evening with some friends when for amusement each girl chose a flower about which each young man was to write a suitable verse. The count had to write his to a spray of mignonette which has been chosen by a girl named Charlotte. He was so charmed with girl and flower that he fell in love with botn, married the girl and added to his family crest a sprig of mignonette with the motto, “Your qualities surpass your charms.” Ever since this meaning has applied in secret to mignonette, and to this day a gift of mignonette, whether potted or plucked, carries with it the same delicate compliment for the recipient.