In Wiffen’s translation of the Spanish poet Garcilaso, we find the red colour only of the Anemone attributed to the blood of Adonis:-- “His sunbeam-tinted tresses drooped unbound, Sweeping the earth with negligence uncouth; The white Anemones that near him blew Felt his red blood, and red for ever grew.” Rapin recounts another story, according to which the Anemone was originally a nymph beloved by Zephyr. This is, perhaps, an explanation of the name of the flower, which is derived from _Anemos_, the wind. “Flora, with envy stung, as tales relate, Condemned a virgin to this change of fate; From Grecian nymphs her beauty bore the prize, Beauty the worst of crimes in jealous eyes; For as with careless steps she trod the plain, Courting the winds to fill her flowing train, Suspicious Flora feared she soon would prove Her rival in her husband Zephyr’s love. So the fair victim fell, whose beauty’s light Had been more lasting, had it been less bright: She, though transformed, as charming as before, The fairest maid is now the fairest flower.” The English name of Wind-flower seems to have been given to the Anemone because some of the species flourish in open places exposed to the wind, before the blasts of which they shiver and tremble in the early Spring. Pliny asserts that the flower never blooms except when the winds blow.----With the Egyptians, the Anemone was the emblem of sickness. According to Pliny, the magicians and wise men in olden times were wont to attribute extraordinary powers to the plant, and ordained that everyone should gather the first Anemone he or she saw in the year, the while repeating, with due solemnity--“I gather thee for a remedy against disease.” The flower was then reverently wrapped in scarlet cloth, and kept undisturbed, unless the gatherer became indisposed, when it was tied either around the neck or arm of the patient. This superstition extended to England, as is shown by the following lines in a ballad:-- “The first Spring-blown Anemone she in his doublet wove, To keep him safe from pestilence wherever he should rove.”