962 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 
of Minerva, who, suffering love to overpower her wis- 
dom, was changed into a myrtle by her offended mis- <2y»., 
tress, and taken pity on by Venus. Others say that \—\ 
Venus, when she first sprang from the bosom of the 
sea, hada wreath of myrtle onher head. The temples 
of this goddess were always surrounded by groves of 
myrtle ; and in Greece she was adored under the name 
of Myrtilla. Pliny says that the Romans and Sabines, 
when they were reconciled, laid down their arms 
under a myrtle tree, and purified themselves with its 
boughs. Wreaths of myrtle were the symbols of 
authority worn by the Athenian magistrates. The 
weapons of war were also formed of this tree; 
and sprigs of myrtle were entwined with the laurel wreaths worn by those 
conquerors, during their triumphs, who had gained a victory without 
bloodshed. The victors in the Olympic and other games were also 
adorned with myrtle. In Rome, two myrtles were placed before the temple 
of Romulus Quirinus, to represent the plebeian and patrician orders, which 
were predicted to be in the ascendency according to the state of the trees. The 
Roman ladies put the leaves of the myrtle into their baths, persuaded that the 
plant of Venus must be favourable to beauty. The branches and berries 
were steeped in wine to give it a flavour; and the fruit was used in cookery, 
as the entire plant was in medicine. The ancient poets made it their favourite 
theme; and Virgil represents Aineas discovering it to be the metamorphosed 
Polydorus. (neid, book iii.) The myrtle has been known in England since 
1597 ; and has been frequently noticed by British poets. Spencer says,— 
** Right in the middest of that Paradise, 
There stood a stately mount, on whose round top 
A gloomy grove of myrtle trees did rise, 
Whose shady boughs sharp steel did never lop, 
Nor wicked beasts their tender boughs did crop ; 
But, like a girland compassed the height,* 
And from their fruitful sides fresh gum did drop, 
That all the ground with precious dew bedight, 
Threw forth most dainty odours, and most sweet delight.” Faerie Queene. ' 
Milton places the myrtle in the bower of Eve; and Thomson, in those beau- 
tiful lines, beginning, “ The lovely young Lavinia once had friends,” com- 
pares Lavinia to a myrtle which 
** Rises far from human eye, 
And breathes its balmy fragance o’er the wild.’ Seasons. Autumn. 


Though the myrtle is now common as underwood in Italy, Pliny tells us 
that it was not a native of that country; and that the first myrtle seen in 
Europe was planted near the tomb of one of the companions of Ulysses at 
Circeii; and he adds that it still retained its Greek name of murtos. It is 
remarkable, that this name is still preserved in all the European languages ; 
the myrtle being called myrtus in Latin; myrto, in Italian and Spanish ; murte, 
in German ; myrter, in Danish; myrten, in Swedish; mirte, in French; and: 
myrta, or murta, in Portuguese. Pliny mentions eleven sorts of myrtles, and 
says that the most odoriferous grew in Egypt. Cato only speaks of three kinds. 
The first cultivation of the myrtle in England is assigned, in the Hortus 
Kewensis, to the year 1629; when Parkinson informs us that he had three 
sorts in his garden; viz. the broad-leaved, and two varieties of the box- 
leaved. Gerard, however, in 1597, says that “ myrtles never bear any fruit in 
England ;” which, surely, implies the cultivation of it in this country before 
that period. Bradley states that myrtles were introduced by Sir Francis 
Carew and Sir Walter Raleigh, in 1585. When they returned to England, after 
a residence in Spain, just before the invasion of the Spanish armada, one 
of these myrtles was planted by Sir F. Carew at Bedington. Evelyn, in 
1678, says, “I know of one (a myrtle) near 80 years old, which has been 
continually exposed, unless it be that, in some exceeding sharp seasons, a 
little dry straw has been thrown upon it ;” and it is supposed that he alluded 
