of trees, the olive (Olea Europea, L.), which is a native of the South of Europe, flowering in July, and introduced to us in 1570. Its fruit is well known, and as much appreciated to-day as in the sixteenth century. A good deal of this is no doubt due to its biblical lore, where it is ever set forth as the symbol of fatness, plenty, and honour from the time the dove first brought back the olive leaf to expectant Noah (Gen. viii. 11) until the time when the Gentile Church was likened to a wild olive-tree grafted into the cultivated stem of the Jewish (Rom. xi. 17)— but a good deal is also due to the classical honour paid to it as the sacred emblem of Minerva, the gift, she believed, and rightly so, the most blessed offering to mankind, the symbol of Peace. Can we forget the great scene of contest carved by the matchless skill of Phidias high on the pediment of that most perfect of temples the Parthenon, the snorting warhorse of Neptune, the dignity of Athene Glaucopus and her gift? All but two of the poet's references are to the olive in this aspect. The exceptions are As You Like It, III. v. 74: If you will know my house, 'Tis at the tuft of olives here hard by. And again, IV. iii. 77: Where in the purlieus of this forest stands Ebony, the wood of Diospyros ebenum and various trees of the genera Ebenaster, Mabola, etc., was known to the poet only from hearsay; at least, he could not have seen the living tree, although the wood itself was imported from the East long before his time. It was well enough known to ancient peoples, and prized for cabinet work, and the bed of sleep in his dark abode is said by Ovid to have been com posed of it ("Met.," xi. 610). There are five references to the wood in the poet's lines, but one of which is literal: The clearstores towards the south north are lustrous as ebony. Twelfth Night, IV. ii. 41. Otherwise we get, "ebon-coloured ink" (Love's King. By heaven, thy love is black as ebony. Ibid., IV. iii. 247. MARCH When daffodils begin to peer, With heigh! the doxy over the dale, The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With heigh! the sweet birds, O, how they sing! For a quart of ale is a dish for a king. How Winter's Tale, IV. iii. 1. OW the boisterous equinox bends almost to the breaking, the naked branches of the trees! How it howls about the chimney-stacks and whistles through the keyhole and tosses the catkins of hazel and the reddening purples of the willows fringing the brooks! But for all that March winds, April showers, Bring forth May flowers; In leafy so runs the jingling adage of the rustic. Warwickshire the reddish-green balls of flowers crowd on the branches of the typical tree of the county, the elm, just as they did in Shakespeare's day. The elm is a handsome tree in early summer, raising its verdure some 120 feet from the ground, but by-and-by, when the sun and rain have marred its first beauty, how dingy it appears. Its brightness vanishes, and nought but a dull, lifeless, neutral green takes its place. We have two species, one native, Ulmus [ 147 ] 10-2 montanus, L., the wych elm; the other naturalized, U. surculosa, Syme, and this may have been brought to us by the Romans. Two of Shakespeare's references are exceedingly pretty: Thou art an elm, my husband, I a vine, Whose weakness married to thy stronger state Comedy of Errors, II. ii. 176. And in a similar train of thought we get: The female ivy so Enrings the barky fingers of the elm. Midsummer-Night's Dream, IV. i. 48. The word "wych" elm is equivalent to hutch elm, because it was used to make coffers to keep provisions in, called hucches, wyches, or whycchs. Thus Dr. Prior quotes : His hallrofe was full of bacon flytches, The other component word, elm, often pronounced "hell-um" by the villagers, is a word nearly identical in all the Germanic and Scandinavian dialects, but is really a foreign word, the Latin ulmus, adopted and varied by them. The use of it points to a South European origin, and would help to bear out the suggestion that we may thank Rome for this tree, as we have for the vine and chestnut. The most delicate and graceful of our native poplars, the aspen, also flowers this month. lt rears its crown of constantly vibrating leaves some 40 to 80 feet, and has the usual European distribution of most of our native trees, reaching into Asia and Northern Africa. Its curious trembling form, from which its specific name (Populus tremula, L.) is derived, is still said to be in accordance with long tradition, due to the fact that from it the wood of the holy rood was made which bore our Saviour's body on Calvary. Ellacombe quotes a verse which gives what he describes as a rude libel" (p. 50), from "The Schoolhouse of Women" (511-545), which thus concludes: 66 The aspin lefe hanging where it be, For if it should the hart would brest. And old Gerard has much the same idea in his concluding remarks on the tree : "In English Aspe and Aspen tree, and may also be called Tremble, after the French name, considering it is a matter whereof women's tongues were made (as the poets and some others report) which seldom cease wagging." Dr. Prior says it was called in Chaucer's time apse, from "æpse," from the hissing sound of the leaves (p. 12). The willow, in favourable seasons, towards the end of this month puts out a multitude of golden catkins on the male tree, and as many green or silvery on the female. The willows belong to a difficult order of plants, and some 160 species, are known, of which we ourselves, under the latest arrangement—that of Dr. White and the Rev. E. P. Linton—are considered to have endless named varieties. The most important are the trees, such as (Salix fragilis) the crack willow or withy, which reaches 80 feet, and the white willow (S. alba, L.). The goat willow or sallow (S. Capræa, L.) is well-known, and the basket osier (S. viminalis, L.) also. From the earliest times the use of the pliable twigs of these plants, has been known, and in Britain this class of work was carried to |