NYMPHAEA NELUMBO;
                  OR,
SACRED EGYPTIAN BEAN.
IN hot climates, where water is the best boon of Heaven, flourish the several
kinds of Nym-
phaeas.  These present the purest colours, and are of an azure blue, or blushing
red, or pale
yellow, the three primary colours, and also of a dazzling white, all which
majestically (different
from our humble aquatics), rise with their foliage above the surface of the
flood, and present
their luxuriant leaves to the vaulted heavens. Nature, as if designing these
plants to be the
masterpiece of her creative power, besides superior grace and beauty, has
also added utility;
for the seed-vessels contain nourishing food for man, as also the roots,
which produce, as will be
hereafter shewn, the profitable potatoe.  As the Egyptians worshipped whatever
was useful,
they accounted these plants sacred; in their feasts they crowned themselves
with the flowers,
and their altars were decorated with the same.  The Egyptian Ceres has the
seed-vessel of the
Blue Lotos in her hand, which the Romans corrupted into the poppy; and sometimes
also that
of the Nelumbo, which the Greeks mistook for the horn of Amalthea.   The
subject of this
narrative, however, relates wholly to the Nyrnphaea Nelumbo, which some modern
naturalists,
instead of reckoning as a Nymphaea, have formed it into a distinct genus;
for its calyx, instead
of being large, consists of four narrow leaves, and the corolla is more multiplied
than in the
other water-lilies, and, wholly unlike other Nymphaeas, it has stamina with
anthers on long and
slender filaments, and its seed-vessel, like an inverted cone, is flat at
the top, and pierced with
hollows, like an honey-comb, for the reception of its beans, or seeds.
The following Eastern Hymn, transfused into the English tongue by Sir William
Jones, gives
us the antiquity of the flower of the Nelumbium, as received among the Asiatics:
AN HINDOO HYMN.
SPIRIT oF SPIRITS, who through every part
Of space expanded and of endless time,
Beyond the stretch of lab'ring thought sublime,
Bade uproar into beauteous order start,
Before heaven was, THOU art:
Ere spheres beneath us roll'd, or spheres above,
Ere earth in firmamental ether hung,
THOU sat'st alone; till, through THY mystic love,
Things unexisting to existence sprung,*
And grateful descant sung.
- The mythology of the Hindoos referred all to one primitive GOD.