,Q4 AEALIACEvE 



•• Its verdure trails the Ivy shoot The little birds' afflicted host ; 



Alone the ground Ironi root to root ; The Ivy, fairest plant to seize, 



Or cUmbing high, with random maze, And promptest, on the neighbouring trees. 



O'er elm, and ash, and alder strays ; O'er bole and branch, with leaves that 

 And round each trunk a network weaves shine 



Fantastic, and each bough with leaves All glossy bright, tenacious twine, 



Of countless shapes entwines, and studs And the else naked woodland scene 



With pale green blooms and half-form'd Clothe with a raiment fresh and green. 



jjmjg_ Fair is that Ivy twine to see ! 



The Ivy, of our native flowers But as ye love the goodly tree, 



That now among the latest pours rend away the clasping wreath,— 



Its pale green bloom, and ripes its seed 'Twill pay the kind support with death. 



Of black and shining balls to feed, Ah, that beneath such semblance fair 



Impervious to the winter's frost. Should lurk conceal'd such deadly snare !" 



The Ivy was regarded by Pliny as very injurious. He remarks that it 

 injures plants wherever it clings to them, that it breaks sepulchres of stone, 

 and undermines city walls. 



The Ivy is truly a climbing plant, sending its shoots upwards so long as 

 they can find a place to which they can attach themselves. When, however, 

 it can find no further support, it then forms tufts of foliage at the summit, 

 and becomes a roundish mass of verdure, putting forth neither rooting fibres 

 nor creeping stems ; and its very leaves, changing their usual form of lobed 

 edges, become either broad or narrow, with almost entire margins. Ivy 

 bushes, about four or five feet high, may thus often be seen in the hedge, 

 deriving little or no support from the plants near ; and though beautiful for 

 their evergreen hue, yet the plant seems to lose all its graceful form under 

 these circumstances. 



The small yellowish-green flowers of the Ivy, with their minute calyx-teeth, 

 may be seen in clusters on the plant from September to November, The 

 leaves, though so well liked by sheep, and fed on by deer, have a bitter 

 flavour. Old physicians recommended a decoction made from them as a 

 sudorific ; and an infusion of the berries in vinegar was one of the numerous 

 medicines recommended to be taken against those severe epidemic diseases 

 which have disappeared since cleanliness and ventilation have received more 

 attention in great cities. An old writer says — " The berries are a singular 

 remedy to prevent the plague, and also to free them that have got it, by 

 drinking the berries thereof, made into powder, for two or three days 

 together ; the leaves, applied with rose-water and oil of roses to the temple 

 and forehead, easeth the headache, though it be of long continuance," He 

 adds, too, that those who are troubled with the spleen, shall find much ease 

 by the continual drinking out of a cup made of Ivy, so as the drink may 

 stand some time therein before it be drunk. He gives for this one of those 

 reasons which seem to have been more convincing to the men of those genera- 

 tions than to modern judgments. "Cato," he says, "saith that Avine put 

 into the Ivy cup will soak through it, by reason of the antipathy that is 

 between them ; this antipathy being, as he says, very great between wine and 

 Ivy, for that one who hath a surfeit by drinking wine will find his speediest 

 cure if he drink a draught of the same wine wherein a handful of Ivy leaves 

 has been steeped." The chief worth of this potion, we should imagine, 

 would be that the bitterness of the Ivy might serve to give a disgust for 

 wine, and prevent a speedy return to the wine-cup. 



