HEATH TRIBE 221 



other trees, however, it is exceedingly beautiful, its bright green leaves 

 happily mixing with the light or dark drapery of its neighbours— the elm 

 and the ash, or the holly and the yew, with which it is almost invariabl}' 

 intermixed. It strikes its roots apparently into the very rocks, thus filling 

 up spaces that would otherwise be barren spots in the scenery. Its beautiful 

 berries, when arrived at maturity, are no doubt conveyed by the birds who 

 feed upon them to the heights of inaccessible mountains, where they readily 

 vegetate in situations almost destitute of soil." 



The Arbutus is said to have been introduced to the shores of the Lakes 

 by the monks of Muckross Abbey, but most of our botanists consider that it 

 is truly wild on that spot, though probably not so in other parts of Ireland. 

 It is a native of the mountainous regions of Southern Europe, as well as of 

 Northern Africa, and of many parts of Asia. The ancient poets often alluded 

 to the tree : thus, Horace says — 



" Now stretch'd beneath the Arbutus' green shade ;" 



and Virgil's direction is familiar to the classic reader — 



" With leafy Arbutus your goats supply." 



The tree during September and October bears very pretty greenish-white, 

 wax-like bells, while the large red fruits of the last year are at the same time 

 on the bough, and only now attaining their rich red ripeness. Bishop Mant 

 refers to its autumnal beauty :— 



' ' Go where the mountain bugle wakes 

 The echoes of Killarney's lakes, 

 And Glena's waving crags incline 

 O'er sainted Mucruss' Abbey shrine, 

 The Arbute opes its pensile bells : 

 All beautiful itself, it tells, 

 In concert with the fading woods, 

 Of winds and equinoctial floods, 

 Which soon their gather'd rage shall pour ; 

 And beauty on that distant shore 

 Forsaken, left to bloom alone, 

 Unnoticed on her desert throne." 



We need hardly describe the dark orange-red fruit, covered with hard 

 tubercles formed by the seeds, and as large as a cherry, to whose resemblance 

 to the strawberry the plant owes one of its familiar names, though it is more 

 often called Arbutus. This word is traced to the Celtic Ar-boise (Austere 

 Bush), because of the harshness of the fruit ; and we find traces of this word 

 in the names by which the shrub is known in several of the continental 

 countries. The French call it Arhousier ; and it is the Arbutus of the Dutch, 

 and the Arbuto of the Italians. The Spaniards call this evergreen Madrona, 

 and the Germans Landbeere ; and in Constantinople it is termed Komaria. 

 It is rather amusing to find the plant called by our old writers Cain-apple, 

 perhaps because the colour reminded them of the blood shed by the first 

 murderer. Pliny says that the name Unedo (One I eat) was given because 

 the fruit was not sufficiently good to tempt the taster to try a second. 

 Parkinson remarks of this plant : " Amatus Lusitanius, I thinke, is the first 

 that ever recorded that the water distilled of the leaves and flowers thereof 



