JAiniAEY. 37 



illustration, in the loving spirit of a first botanical 

 lesson, which should be well impressed upon the 

 recollection ; and so will we again recur to it as a 

 standing dish in the rustic hall, or dark timbered 

 kitchen. 



But let me say a word about IYT, for the present is 

 the only fair chance to mention it at least with full 

 justice when, as now, it is in its acme of beauty and 

 luxuriance. Notwithstanding its green aspect about 

 trees and buildings at a season when every leaf is an 

 acquisition, modern associations are not so brilliant 

 with regard to ivy as ancient ones were, when, at the 

 sight of its coronals, man, woman, and child grew 

 mad with delight, and shouted " lo BACCHUS !" 



" Oh ! how could fancy crown with thee, 



In ancient times the God of Wine, 

 And bid thee at the banquet be 



Companion of the vine ?" 



Our ideas revert involuntary to the desolate ruin 

 where the ivy encompasses the tempest-riven towers 

 with its hundred Briarean arms, or waves darkly and 

 mournfully about the broken tracery of the windows 

 of many a crumbling abbey and priory. In such 

 places as at Caerphilly and Pembroke Castles, in 

 South Wales, the bole becomes by age of a tree-like 

 size. A vast ivy-tree enshrouds a portion of the ruins 

 of Maxstoke Priory, "Warwickshire. Thus embowered, 

 such abandoned ruins become 



" a place of ivy, darkly green, 

 Where laughter's light is o'er." 



Good wine in the present day needs no ivy-bush to 

 announce it as in days of yore, and the very hotels 

 that formerly bore the sign, now retain the bwk only, 



