Forms: 4 flaume, 4–5 flamme, (5 flome), 4–6 flawme, flaumbe, 5–7 flambe, (7 flam), 4– flame. [a. OF. flambe, flamme:—L. flamma, of disputed etymology; according to some scholars for *flāgma, f. root *flăg- in flagrāre to blaze; according to others for *flāma, f. flā-re to blow.]
1. Vapor heated to the point of combustion; ignited gas. Also, † flame of fire.
a. without plural.
c. 1384. Chaucer, H. Fame, II. 261.
| For, as flaumbe ys but lyghted smoke, | |
| Ryght too soun ys air ybroke. |
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., X. iv. (1495), 376. Flamme is fyre in ayry matere.
c. 1400. Maundev. (Roxb.), viii. 29. Oute of þe whilk þer commes flawme of fire of diuerse colours.
1563. W. Fulke, Meteors (1640), 23. Where earthquakes have beene, great abundance of smoke, flame, and ashes, is cast out, when the abundance of brimstone that is under the ground, through violent motion is set on fire and breaketh forth.
1678. Hobbes, Decam., vi. 60. Flame is nothing but a multitude of sparks, and sparks are but the atoms of the fuel dissipated by the incredible swift motion of the movent, which makes every spark to seem a hundred times greater than it is, as appears by this; that, when a man swings in the air a small stick fired at one end, though the motion cannot be very swift, yet the fire will appear to the eye to be a long, straight, or crooked line.
1704. Newton, Opticks, III. xi. 134. Is not flame a Vapour, Fume, or Exhalation heated red hot, that is, so hot as to shine?
1831. Brewster, Newton (1855), II. xxv. 368. Flame consists of particles of carbon brought to a white heat,—an opinion of Sir Humphry Davy’s.
b. with plural: A portion of ignited vapor, often spire-like or tongue-like. † To put to flames: to set on fire.
a. 1340. Hampole, Psalter, xxviii. [xxix.] 7. Þe voice of lord sherand þe flaume of fire.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. XVII. 239. Þe weyke and fyre · wil make a warme flaumbe.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 12009. Flammes of fyre fuerse to behold.
c. 1450. Lonelich, Grail, xlviii. 174.
| How fir and flambes they Casten Echedel | |
| vppon Moys there that he sat. |
a. 1533. Ld. Berners, Huon, lxiv. 221. His vysage became lyke a flame of fyer.
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., IV. 553.
| She sprinkl’d thrice, with Wine, the Vestal Fire, | |
| Thrice to the vaulted Roof the Flames aspire. |
1722. Sewel, Hist. Quakers (1795), I. iv. 272. When my work was in the furnace, and as I passed through the fire, by thee I was not consumed, though the flames ascended above my head.
1800. trans. Lagrange’s Chem., II. 245. The acid burns with a blue flame.
1874. Morley, Compromise (1886), 17. Well might one ask whether absurdity could go further than when the most important of newspapers criticised Darwin’s speculations on the descent of man, from the point of view of property and a stake in the country, and severely censured him for revealing his zoological conclusions to the general public at a moment when the sky of Paris was red with the incendiary flames of the Commune.
c. fig. (see also 6.)
1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VI., 154. These townes were not yelded voluntarilye by the Englishe souldiors, but they were thereunto compelled by the cytizens and the inhabitauntes of the townes, whiche apparantly perceyuing, that the greate flamme of the Englishe force was extinct and consumid, rose against the Capitaines, and other opened the gates to their enemies, or constrained them to render vpon a composicion.
1601. Shaks., All’s Well that ends Well, I. ii. 59.
| Let me not liue (quoth hee) | |
| After my flame lackes oyle, to be the snuffe | |
| Of yonger spirits. |
1633. Favine, Theat. Hon., II. i. 61. Saint Hierome, the Father of Learning, and cleare flame of the Church.
1887. Bowen, Virg. Æneid, I. 263.
| War’s great flame he shall kindle in Italy, vanquish the land’s | |
| Fierce wild tribes, found cities and peaceful ways for his bands. |
d. pl. (with the) = fire. Chiefly with reference to death or destruction by burning. Phrase, to commit to the flames.
1483. Caxton, Gold. Leg., 249/2. The blessid chyldren wente thorugh the flambes.
1656. Cowley, Poems, Misc., 10.
| Pity him, Jove! and his bold theft allow; | |
| The flames he once stole from thee grant him now. |
1714. Steele, Englishman, No. 55, 9 Feb., 354. When Perkin was brought, attended by his proper Associates, to the Place of Conflagration, after having been drawn thrice round a magnificent Bonfire, he was put into the flames with the General Acclamation of the Multitude, which was unspeakably large.
1782. Priestley, Corrupt. Chr., II. IX. 191. Ziska, the general of the Hussites, fell upon the sect of the Beghards in 1421, and ‘put some to the sword, and condemned the rest to the flames, which dreadful punishment they sustained with the most cheerful fortitude.’
1817. Shelley, Revolt of Islam, XII. xxv. 1.
| When the consuming flames had wrapt ye round, | |
| The hope which I had cherished went away; | |
| I fell in agony on the senseless ground, | |
| And hid mine eyes in dust, and far astray | |
| My mind was gone. |
e. with reference to hell or purgatory.
1382. Wyclif, Luke xvi. 24. Send Lazarus, that he dippe the laste part of his fyngur in water, and kele my tunge; for I am turmentid in this flawme.
c. 1575. Fulke, Confut. Doctr. Purgatory (1577), 182. Wherin you haue more regarde to the heating of your owne harthe, then to the cooling of the selye soules, to kindle a good fire in your owne kitchen, then to quench the flambes of purgatory.
1637–50. Row, The History of the Kirk of Scotland (1842), 304.
| Famine and gallows are not eneugh; | |
| Some new wrath waits for thee: | |
| By hellish flams thy soule, by doggs | |
| Fat neck devoured bee. |
1842. Tennyson, The Sisters, 7.
| She died: she went to burning flame: | |
| She mix’d her ancient blood with shame. |
† f. Vital flame (see quot.). Obs. in scientific use.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Vital Flame, a kind of subtil gentle kindled Heat which some suppose to be in the Heart of Living-Creatures; so that for its Preservation, they judge the Air taken in by Breathing, to be necessary, as it is to the keeping in of ordinary Flame.
2. The condition of visible combustion. In phrases, On flame, † on or of a flame, in a flame, in flames: blazing, on fire; transf. of a wound, etc., inflamed; fig. inflamed with anger, passion, or zeal. Also to put or set on or in († a) flame, to burst into flame(s, etc. See also AFLAME.
1490. Caxton, Eneydos, ii. 14. How the cyte was cruelly sette a fyre, and on a flamm; And how Eneas, armed, bare his fader oute of the same cyte.
1638. Sir T. Herbert, Trav. (ed. 2), 297. The richer sort have redolent gums, or aromatick odours of Arabia incendiated or put to flames, wherein the dead body is laid, involv’d in linnen pure white, sweet, and delicate.
1652. J. Wadsworth, trans. Sandoval’s Civ. Wars Spain, 351–2. The timber of the Church taking fire therewith, all was immediately of a flame; and the poor people’s having no waie out but through the fire, nor any breathing place within the Church, were well-nigh all consumed.
1658. A. Fox, trans. Wurtz’ Surg., III. i. 220. If a wound be in a flame when drest, it signifieth that a sharp humor is faln into it, which eateth of the flesh already healed.
1656. Cowley, Poems, Mistress, 15.
| But, oh, what other Heart is there, | |
| Which sighes and crouds to hers so neere? | |
| ’Tis all on flame, and does, like fire, | |
| To that, as to it’s Heaven, aspire. |
1676. Hobbes, Iliad (1677), 182.
| Trojans come on, and break me down this Wall, | |
| And set the Argives hollow ships on flame. |
1685. Crowne, Sir C. Nice, v. 49. What a flame had your negligence put me into.
1697. Dampier, Voy., I. 116. When they came to the sandy Bay, they found their Boat all in Flames.
1711. De Foe, Mem. Cavalier (1840), 47. I cannot pretend to describe the cruelty of this day; the town by five in the afternoon was all on a flame, the wealth consumed was inestimable, and a loss to the very conqueror.
1764. Goldsm., Trav., 219.
| Unknown those powers that raise the soul to flame, | |
| Catch every nerve and vibrate through the frame. |
1790. Beatson, Nav. & Mil. Mem., I. 74. At this time, Mr Vernon was so much the idol of the people, that the least neglect or disrespect towards him, was capable of setting the nation in a flame against the Minister, who was far from being popular.
1790. Willock, Voy., 11. The poor simpleton took his advice, and immediately his face was all over in a flame.
1818. Shelley, Rev. Islam, III. xvi. 8.
| Below the smoke of roofs involved in flame | |
| Rested like night, all else was clearly shewn | |
| In that broad glare, yet sound to me none came, | |
| But of the living blood that ran within my frame. |
1847. Tennyson, Princ., VI. 348.
| The day, | |
| Descending, struck athwart the hall, and shot | |
| A flying splendor out of brass and steel, | |
| That o’er the statues leapt from head to head, | |
| Nor fired an angry Pallas on the helm, | |
| Now set a wrathful Dian’s moon on flame. |
1879. M. Pattison, Milton, 53. Once, at twenty, he [Milton] was set all on flame by the casual meeting, in one of his walks in the suburbs of London, with a damsel whom he never saw again.
3. transf. A bright beam or ray of light (esp. from a heavenly body).
c. 1374. Chaucer, Boeth., II. Metr. iii. 39. Þe flamus of þe sonne þat ouer comeþ þe sterre lyȝt.
1572. Bossewell, Armorie, II. 132. The latines call these starres Crinitae, because they cast from them flambes in maner of heares, whyche kinde of starre whensoeuer it appeareth, pronosticatethe, eyther pestilence, famine, or warre.
1611. Bible, Wisd. xvii. 5. No power of the fire might giue them light: neither could the bright flames of the starres endure to lighten that horrible night.
1710. Pope, Windsor For., 389.
| Tempt icy seas, where scarce the waters roll, | |
| Where clearer flames glow round the frozen pole. |
1842. Longf., Sp. Stud., III. v.
| At midnight, when the moon began | |
| To show her silver flame, | |
| There came to him no Gypsy man, | |
| The Gypsy lassie came. |
1877. Bryant, Poems, Little People of Snow, 184.
| These are the northern lights, such as thou seest | |
| In the midwinter nights, cold, wandering flames, | |
| That float with our processions, through the air. |
b. pl. Applied humorously to ‘red’ hair. Also to one who has such hair. Cf. CARROT 3.
1823. ‘J. Bee,’ Slang, Flames—red-haired people receive this appellation; but ’tis mostly confined to females, e. g. ‘Looking up to the vomen’s vard von day, vho should I fling my precious ogles upon but Flames—she as lived at the Blue Posts, ye know, vhen Jemmy Soft vas tied up.’
4. fig. Bright or glowing light; brilliance, brilliant coloring.
1781. Cowper, Friendship, ii.
| If every polish’d gem we find | |
| Illuminating heart or mind, | |
| Provoke to imitation; | |
| No wonder friendship does the same, | |
| That jewel of the purest flame, | |
| Or rather constellation. |
1873. Ouida, Pascarèl, II. 162. The flame of roses that burns on every handsbreadth of untilled ground and springs like a rainbow above the cloud of every darkling roof of wall.
5. Something resembling a flame of fire: † a. A flame-shaped ornament. b. A streak or patch of color or the like.
1602. Segar, Hon. Mil. & Civ., II. xvii. 88. Mantelets of greene cloth of siluer … bordered about with flambes of golde.
1680. Lond. Gaz., No. 1562/4. A Bright Bay Gelding … a white Flame from the Forehead almost to the Nostrils.
1820. Shelley, Witch, vi. 3.
| Then the sly serpent, in the golden flame | |
| Of his own volumes intervolved. |
1888. Miss Braddon, Fatal Three, I. vi. Flaunting dragon’s-mouth and yellow stonecrop made a flame of colour on the top.
6. In certain figurative applications of sense 1.
a. A burning feeling or passion, esp. of love: To fan the flame: to heighten its intensity by artificial or artful means.
a. 1340. Hampole, Psalter, cxxxvii. 1. Alle kyndul þou in þe flawme of þi luf.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Pars. T., ¶ 279. Thanne feeleth he anoon a flambe of delit.
a. 1450–1530. Myrr. our Ladye, 212. Thre flaumbes of charyte, come euenly furthe vnto the parfeccion, & makynge of one worke.
1601. Shaks., All’s Well that ends Well, I. iii. 217.
| Did ever in so true a flame of liking | |
| Wish chastely and love dearly. |
1667. Milton, P. L., V. 807.
| Abdiel … Stood up, and in a flame of zeale severe | |
| The current of his fury thus oppos’d. |
1702. Pope, Sapho, 19.
| All other loves are lost in only thine, | |
| O youth ungrateful to a flame like mine! |
1708. Rowe, Royal Convert, Prologue.
| Since the same Flame, by different Ways express’d, | |
| Glows in the Heroe’s and the Poet’s Breast. |
1783. J. O’Keeffe, Birth-day, 17.
| The lovely town-bred dame, | |
| Dear cause of many a flame, | |
| Each smart swears he ne’er such a beauty saw. |
1800. Mrs. Hervey, The Mourtray Family, IV. 212. I exulted extremely in the effect this produced, and neglected no opportunity of fanning the flame.
1814. Cary, Dante, Paradise, III. 68.
| She seem’d | |
| With love’s first flame to glow. |
1885. Mabel Collins, The Prettiest Woman in Warsaw, ix. This flame of ardent ambition kept her alive; it gave her a purpose for which to exist.
b. quasi-concr. The object of one’s love. Formerly poet.; now only jocular.
1647. Cowley, Mistress, Eccho, ii.
| Thy flame, whilst living, or a flower, | |
| Was of less beauty, and less ravishing power. |
1700. Prior, Ode.
| The Merchant, to secure his Treasure, | |
| Conveys it in a borrow’d Name: | |
| Euphelia serves to grace my Measure; | |
| But Chloe is my real Flame. |
a. 1760. J. Browne, Poems, Let. to Corinna (1768), 109.
| My earliest flame, to whom I owe | |
| All that a Captain needs to know; | |
| Dress, and quadrille, and air, and chat, | |
| Lewd songs, loud laughter, and all that. |
1807. W. Irving, Salmag. (1824), 263. This little damsel, tradition says, was my uncle John’s third flame.
1840. Thackeray, Paris (1872), 237. Her heart remains faithful to her old flame, the doctor.
† c. Brightness of fancy, power of genius, vigor of thought. Obs.
1642. Denham, Cooper’s H., 88.
| Like him in birth, thou shouldst be like in Fame, | |
| As thine his fate, if mine had beene his [Homer’s] Flame. |
1672. Villiers (Dk. Buckhm.), Rehearsal, I. I write for some persons of Quality, and peculiar friends of mine, that understand what Flame and Power in writing is.
1702. Rowe, Tamerl., Prologue.
| Like him (tho’ much unequal to his Flame) | |
| Our Author makes a pious Prince his Theme. |
† 7. A name of a variety of carnation. (See quot.)
1717. Bradley, Fam. Dict., s.v. Carnation, The Flames have a red Ground always strip’d with Black or very dark Colours.
8. A name given to certain British moths.
1819. G. Samouelle, Entomol. Compend., 399. Noctua putris, the Flame. Ibid., 432. Geometra rubiadata, the Flame.
1862. Morris, Brit. Moths, II. 15. Anticlea rubidaria, the Flame.
9. attrib. and Comb. a. simple attrib., as flame banner, -heat, -lamp, -light, -signal, -tongue.
1880. Tennyson, Columbus. The great *flame-banner borne by Teneriffe.
1812–6. J. Smith, Panorama Sc. & Art, I. 11. In changing the form of iron, the white *flame heat is used, and, according to the size of the work, it is battered by one, two, or more men, with sledge hammers, the largest size of which, called About Sledges, are slung entirely round, with both hands nearly at the extremity.
1888. Daily News, 10 May, 3/1. Miners’ electric lamps … so convenient … that it would really seem to be nothing short of criminal folly to run the slightest risk with *flame lamps.
1611. Speed, Hist. Gt. Brit., VI. ix. 75. Vntill the search of Tyrants by the *flame-light of Persecutions, had found out all secret places for the safeties and assemblies of Gods Saints.
a. 1835. Mrs. Hemans, League of Alps, xxvi. Poems (1875), 237.
| Gave answer, till the sky’s blue hollows rung: | |
| And the *flame-signals through the midnight sprung. |
1876. Geo. Eliot, Dan. Der., VIII. lxiv. For what place, though it were the flowery vale of Enna, may not the inward sense turn into a circle of punishment where the flowers are no better than a crop of *flame-tongues burning the soles of our feet?
b. objective, as flame-breathing, -darting, -snorting; also flame-devoted.
1621. G. Sandys, Ovid’s Met., VII. (1626), 235.
| *Flame-breathing buls you tam’d; you made them bow | |
| Their stubborne necks vnto the seruill plow. |
1611. Sylvester, Du Bartas, II. iv. III. Schisme, 403.
| The Welkin’s studded with new Blazing-Stars, | |
| Flame-darting Lances, fiery Crowns and Cars. |
1767. W. L. Lewis, Statius’ Thebaid, VI. 75.
| Mean while they crown with Cypress, Sign of Drear, | |
| And baleful Yew the *Flame-devoted Bier. |
1614. Sylvester, Du Bartas, Bethulia’s Rescue, III. 1.
| *Flame-snorting Phlegon’s ruddy breath began | |
| Reducing Day, to gild the Indian. |
c. instrumental and originative, as flame-bred, -feathered, -irradiated, -robed, -sparkling, -tipped, -uplifted, -winged.
1606. Sylvester, Du Bartas, II. iv. II. Magnificence, 360.
| Lord, give her mee, alas! I pine, I die; | |
| Or if I live, I live her *Flame-bred-Flie. | |
| Ibid. (1591), I. iv. 272. | |
| Ay fiercely threats, with his *flame-feath’red arrow | |
| To shoot the sparkling starry Viper thorough. |
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., xciii.
| Let not the Sun be proud, that high-wrought drosse | |
| Shines from his *flame-irradiated Earth. |
1752. H. M[oore], To Memory of Dr. Doddridge, vii.
| There while he joins the ever warbling Choir, | |
| Or listens to the sound of Gabriel’s Lyre, | |
| With Cherubs round the Throne adoring bows, | |
| Or midst the *flame-rob’d Bands a Seraph glows. |
1625. K. Long, trans. Barclay’s Argenis, V. xx. 402.
| As much, thy lookes, and golden lockes to see, | |
| Thy chaste *flame-sparkling eyes, reioyces shee. |
1836. Keble, in Lyra Apost. (1849), 215.
| Age after age, where Antichrist hath reigned, | |
| Some *flame-tipt arrow of the Almighty falls, | |
| Imperial cities lie in heaps profaned, | |
| Fire blazes round apostate council-halls. |
1842. Sir A. De Vere, Song of Faith, 52.
| The legion hands | |
| Of *flame-uplifted Demons are thrust forth. |
1621. G. Sandys, Ovid’s Met., XIV. (1626), 890.
| Ioue condescends: with clouds the day benights; | |
| And with *flame-winged thunder earth affrights. |
a. 1881. Rossetti, House of Life, ix.
| One flame-winged brought a white-winged harp-player | |
| Even where my lady and I lay all alone. |
d. parasynthetic and similative, as flame-eyed, -faced, -haired, -like, -shaped adjs.; flame-like, -wise advs.; limitative, as flame-proof.
1609. B. Jonson, Masque of Queens, Wks. (Rtldg.), 568/2.
| Draw to thee Bitterness, whose pores sweat gall; | |
| She, *flame-ey’d Rage; Rage, Mischief. |
1871. Palgrave, Lyr. Poems, 50.
| Sirs, from your land of freedom | |
| Ye cannot fathom our land! | |
| —They march out by Pausilippo | |
| That *flame-faced patriot band. |
c. 1605. Rowley, Birth Merl., IV. v. 343. Above yon *flame-haired beam that upwards shoots, appears a dragon’s head, out of whose mouth two streaming lights point their flame-feathered darts contrary ways, yet both shall have their aims.
1567. J. Maplet, A Greene Forest, or a Naturall Historie, 5 b. In the night time it [the Chrusopasse] is *flamelike, in the day time yelow or wan.
1621. G. Sandys, Ovid’s Met., XV. (1626), 717.
| He, in his Fane, brest-high his bodie rais’d: | |
| Rouling about his eyes that flame-like blaz’d. |
1886. Illustr. Lond. News, 2 Jan. The materials had been made *flame-proof.
1876. D. Wilson, Preh. Man, vii. (ed. 3), 193. One *flame-shaped arrow-head chipped with the nicest art, is evidently executed as a display of lapidary skill.
1865. Swinburne, Atalanta, 37.
| Enough; for wise words fail me, and my heart | |
| Takes fire and trembles *flamewise, O my son. |
10. Special comb.: flame-bearer, a book-name for the genus Selasphorus of humming-birds, characterized by the great brilliancy of the gorgets of the males; flame-bed (Steam-engine) (see quot.); flame-box, ‘sometimes applied to that portion of the shell of a steam boiler which contains the smoke or flame tubes’ (Lockwood, 1892); flame-bridge, ‘a wall rising from the floor of a furnace to cause the flame to impinge upon the bottom of the boiler’ (Knight, 1874); flame-cap, a pale cap-like appearance that the upper part of the flame of a safety-lamp or fire-damp indicator assumes, and that indicates the presence of gas; flame carpet, the moth Coremia propugnaria; flame-cell, a small cavity in the excretory canal of a flat-worm (see quot.); flame-chamber (see quot.); flame-engine, ‘an early name for the gas-engine, in which the piston is moved by the expansion due to the sudden combustion of a body of gas in the cylinder’ (Knight, 1874); flame-flue, ‘the combustion flue of a horizontal boiler, so named to distinguish it from the smoke or return flues which are built in brick-work’ (Lockwood, 1892); flame-furnace, a furnace in which the ore or metal is exposed to the action of flame, but is not in contact with the fuel; † flame-god, ? the sun; flame-kiln (cf. flame-furnace); flame-plates, the top or crown plates of a boiler flue or fire-box (Lockwood, 1888); flame-shoulder, the moth Noctua plecta.
1882. Ogilvie, s.v., The little *flame-bearer (Selasphorus scintilla) inhabits the inner side of the extinct volcano Chiriqui, in Veragua.
1859. Rankine, Steam Engine, § 304. It [the flame chamber] has often a floor of fire-brick, called the *flame bed.
1893. Dublin Rev., CXIII. July, 653. The wick of the lamp has to be pulled down until the flame becomes pale and non-luminous. In this condition it is small and of low temperature, and therefore ill-suited to produce *flame caps.
1862. Morris, Brit. Moths, II. 18. Coremia propugnaria, *Flame Carpet.
1888. Encycl. Brit. (ed. 9), XXIII. 537/2. The spaces between the round connective-tissue cells of the body are star-shaped in form, and into these the finest excretory tubules … open by funnels, into each of which projects a vibratile cilium, thus constituting the so-called *‘flame-cells.’
1859. Rankine, Steam Engine, § 304. The *flame-chamber, being the space immediately behind the bridge in which the combustion of the inflammable gases that pass over the bridge is or ought to be completed.
1862. Atlantic Monthly, X. July, 70/2. He [Ericsson] … soon discovered that his *flame-engine, when worked by the combustion of mineral coals, was a different thing from the experimental model he had tried in the highlands of Sweden, with fuel composed of the splinters of fine pine wood.
1888. Lockwood’s Dict. Mech. Engin., *Flame-furnace, a reverberatory furnace.
1599. Marston, Sco. Villanie, I. ii. 175.
| I thinke the blind doth see, the *flame God rise | |
| From Sisters couch, each morning to the skies, | |
| Glowing with lust. |
1807. Vancouver, Agric. Devon (1813), 28. This limestone … is burnt in what are called *flame-kilns.
1862. Morris, Brit. Moths., II. 141. Noctua plecta, *Flame-shoulder.
b. in some names of plants with vivid scarlet or crimson flowers: flame-flower, a species of Kniphofia (Tritoma); flame lily (see quot.); flame-tree, (a) the Sterculia acerifolia of New South Wales; (b) the Nuytsia floribunda of Western Australia, also called fire-tree; (c) the Butea frondosa or palash tree.
1882. Garden, 14 Jan., 19/2. We came across several colonies of Pampas Grass here and there, associated with *Flame flowers (Tritoma), a happy idea, as the contrast made by the two when in flower late in summer must be excellent.
1841. Mrs. Loudon, Ladies’ Flower-Gard., 129. Pyrolirion, the *Flame Lily.
1866. Treas. Bot., *Flame tree. Brachychiton acerifolium.
1883. Cassell’s Fam. Mag., Oct., 685/1. It [the palash] is a fair-sized tree, and its flowers are very bright scarlet, from which it is frequently spoken of as the ‘flame tree,’ and is a great favourite with the natives, who offer the flowers in their temples, and decorate their persons with them also, the women frequently entwining them in their hair on festive occasions.
1885. Mrs. C. Praed, Australian Life, 96. There are flame-trees, showing in spring vivid patches of crimson.
