A bower covered with the intense, yet subtle, perfume of the honeysuckle, doubly sweet in the hot sun that had ripened the blossoms and drawn out their inmost sweetness, was just the place to send "saucy Beatrice" for the purpose of lighting the flame of love for _Benedick_, and just the place to send, a little later, the cynical _Benedick_ for the purpose of awakening his interest in the "Lady Disdain." Shakespeare evidently knew that the honeysuckle is the flower of ardent lovers, and so he framed his pleachèd bower with these sweet-scented blossoms. The French have a tender name for the flower, _cher feu_ (dear flame), because it is given by lovers to one another. The other French name, _chèvre feuille_, is derived from the Latin _caprifolium_ (goat-leaf), which may have been given to it because the plant leaps over high rocks and precipices, where only goats and others of the cloven-footed tribe dare venture. The honeysuckle in Shakespeare's day was a favorite remedy for wounds in the head. Witches also valued it for their sorcery. According to sorcerers and astrologers this plant was under the rule of Mercury. It is hard to decide when the honeysuckle is at its best. Whether at hot noontide when the clusters of pale buff and white horns of plenty tipped with their long, feathery threads pour their incense into the golden sunlight, or when the less pungent, but equally intoxicating, perfume floats upon the silvery blue air of a moonlit night. "How sweetly smells the Honeysuckle, in the hush'd night as if the world were one of utter peace and love and gentleness." Landor has thus expressed what the delicious honeysuckle makes us feel. "The monthly honeysuckle," writes Celia Thaxter, "is most divine. Such vigor of growth I have never seen in any other plant. It climbs the trellis on my piazza and spreads its superb clusters of flowers from time to time all summer. Each cluster is a triumph of beauty, flat in the center and curving out to the blossoming edge in joyous lines of loveliness, most like a wreath of heavenly trumpets breathing melodies of perfume to the air. Each trumpet of lustrous white deepens to a yellower tint in the center where the small ends meet; each blossom where it opens at the lips is tipped with fresh pink; each sends out a group of long stamens from its slender throat like rays of light; and the whole circle of radiant flowers has an effect of gladness and glory indescribable: the very sight of it lifts and refreshes the human heart. And for its odor, it is like the spirit of romance, sweet as youth's tender dreams. It is summer's very soul." Enchanting season of fern and honeysuckle, perfumed stars that shine through green leaves and bells that send forth peals of incense instead of sound!