and Italy.

* * * * *

CHAPTER V.

BRUNELLA.

1. It ought to have been added to the statements of general law in
irregular flowers, in Chapter I. of this volume, § 6, that if the petals,
while brought into relations of inequality, still retain their perfect
petal form,--and whether broad or narrow, extended or reduced, remain
clearly _leaves_, as in the pansy, pea, or azalea, and assume no grotesque
or obscure outline,--the flower, though injured, is not to be thought of as
corrupted or misled. But if any of the petals lose their definite character
as such, and become swollen, solidified, stiffened, or strained into any
other form or function than that of petals, the flower is to be looked upon
as affected by some kind of constant evil influence; and, so far as we
conceive of any spiritual power being concerned in the protection or
affliction of the inferior orders of creatures, it will be felt to bear the
aspect of possession by, or pollution by, a more or less degraded
Spirit.[30]

2. I have already enough spoken of the special manifestation of this
character in the orders Contorta and Satyrium, vol. i., p. 91, and the
reader will find the parallel aspects of the Draconidæ dwelt upon at length
in the 86th and 87th paragraphs of the 'Queen of the Air,' where also their
relation to the labiate group is touched upon. But I am far more
embarrassed by the symbolism of that group which I called 'Vestales,' from
their especially domestic character and their serviceable purity; but which