386 



TJic Country Gentleman s Magazine 

 he threw himself to the ground 



comfort him 

 in despair. 



This tree was known to the Greeks and 

 Romans, and their historians inform us that 

 the Egyptians made their mummy cases of 

 the wood, and that the Greeks who died for 

 their country had their ashes preserved in 

 cypress. We are also told that it was sacred 

 to the heathen goddess Night, the daughter 

 of Chaos, who sat with pale face and scythe in 

 hand at the foot of Pluto's throne. We are 

 also told that it was dedicated to Pluto, be- 

 cause, when cut down, the tree never throAvs 

 up suckers. 



The cypress was esteemed the emblem of 

 immortality, from its being evergreen, and 

 from its powers of rising again when bent 

 down by the wind. Horace mentions the 

 custom of shutting up in the tombs with the 

 dead a branch of cypress, and enveloping the 

 body in its branches, and he speaks of its bal- 

 samic odour being able to neutralize the in- 

 fectious exhalations proceeding from the 

 corpse. We also learn that it was commonly 

 used at the funerals of people of eminence, 

 and it was placed at the door or in the 

 vestibule of the house in which the body 

 lay, to denote that death had visited the 

 family. Virgil frequently speaks of its use in 

 funeral ceremonies, particularly in that of 

 Misenos. It has long been a custom with 

 the Turks and other eastern nations to plant 

 cypress trees at each end of the graves when 

 they inter their dead. These cypress trees 

 are so numerous at Scutari that the cemetery 

 there resembles one vast forest. The common 

 phrase with us, of calling our burial places 

 the garden of the dead, bears an eastern 

 origin, for in antient times, tombs and 

 cemeteries were more decorated than gardens ; 

 hence the custom of planting trees in such 

 numbers. They served as objects of decora- 

 tion on the one hand, and as emblems of 

 immortality on the other. In the Middle 



ages we are treated with anecdotes and 

 superstitious tales in connexion with this tree, 

 which mostly turns upon the point of its 

 durability. As this quality is associated with 

 its unchangeableness in life, it bears upon my 

 subject. I may note that the Popes were 

 buried in coffins of this wood from the belief 

 that it would never decay. Leon Alberti, a 

 celebrated Florentine architect of the 15th 

 century, tells us that he found a vessel of this 

 wood, that had been submerged 1300 years, 

 to be perfectly sound. The doors of St. 

 Peter's at Rome, which had lasted from the 

 time of Constantine to that of F.ugene the 

 Fourth (that is, above 11 00 years) were per- 

 fectly sound when removed to give place to 

 gates of brass. I am not able to say what 

 came of these doors, but Ave have a miracle 

 of St Giles recorded in the " Golden Legend " 

 which bears closely upon them. We are in- 

 formed that the Saint, when at Rome, cast 

 two doors of cypress wood into the Tiber, and 

 recommended them to heavenly guidance, 

 and that on his return to France found them 

 at the gates of his monastery, and set them up 

 as the doors of his own church. 



I could enlarge upon this subject did time 

 permit, but I must pass the point of its dura- 

 bility over, with a quotation from Pliny, Avho 

 informs us that the statue of Jupiter in the 

 capital, which was formed of cypress, had ex- 

 isted 600 years without shewing the slightest 

 symptoms of decay. He also adds, that the 

 doors of the temple of Diana at Ephesus, 

 Avhich were of this wood, when 400 years old, 

 had the appearance of being quite new, and 

 that Plato, who looked upon this wood as 

 more durable than brass, had his code of laws 

 engraved upon it. Our highest poets make 

 frequent allusions to the cypress. Lord 

 Byron, speaking of the simoon, alludes to 

 the cypress as " the only constant mourner 

 of the dead." 



