330 plikt's natural HISTORY. [Book XV. 



to Venus Myrtea, known at the present day by the name of 

 Murcia. 



CHAP. 37. ELEVEN VARIETIES OF THE MYRTLE. 



Cato 42 makes mention of three varieties of the myrtle, the 

 black, white, and the conjugula, perhaps so called from 

 its reference to conjugal unions, and belonging to the same 

 species as that which grew where Cluacina's statues now 

 stand : at the present day the varieties are differently distin- 

 guished into the cultivated and the wild 43 myrtle, each of 

 which includes a kind with a large leaf. The kind known as 

 " oxymyrsine," 44 belongs only to the wild variety : ornamental 

 gardeners classify several varieties of the cultivated kind ; the 

 " Tarentine," 45 they speak of as a myrtle with a small leaf, 

 the myrtle of this country 46 as having a broad leaf, and the 

 hexasticha 47 as being very thickly covered with leaves, growing 

 in rows of six : it is not, however, made any use of. There 

 are two other kinds, that are branchy and well covered. In 

 my opinion, the conjugula is the same that is now called the 

 Eoman myrtle. It is in Egypt that the myrtle is most 

 odoriferous. 



Cato 48 has taught us how to make a wine from the black 

 myrtle, by drying it thoroughly in the shade, and then putting 

 it in must : he says, also, that if the berries are not quite dry, 

 it will produce an oil. Since his time a method has been dis- 

 covered of making a pale wine from the white variety ; two 

 sextarii of pounded myrtle are steeped in three semi-sextarii of 

 wine, and the mixture is then subjected to pressure. 



The leaves 49 also are dried by themselves till they are capa- 

 ble of being reduced to a powder, which is used for the treat- 

 ment of sores on the human body : this powder is of a Rightly 

 corrosive nature, and is employed also for the purpose of 

 checking the perspiration. A thing that is still more re- 



42 De Re Rust. c. 8, 



43 The so-called wild myrtle does not in reality belong to the genus 

 Myrtus. 



44 See B. xxiii. c. 83 ; the Ruscus aculeatus of the family of the Asparagea. 



45 The common myrtle, Myrtus communis of the naturalists. 



46 Or Roman myrtle, a variety of the Myrtus communis. 



47 The " six row " myrtle. Fee thinks "that it helongs to the Myrtus 

 angustifolia Boetica of Bauhin. 



« De Re Rust. 125. 49 See B. xxiii. c. 81. 



