XVI, pfarit Tsore, "I^ege^/, ariR iQijrlc/, 



in many mediaeval legends, wherein trees are represented as bending 

 their boughs and offering their fruits to the Virgin and her Divine 

 Infant. So, again, during the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt, 

 trees are said to have opened and concealed the fugitives from 

 Herod's brutal soldiery. Certain trees (notably the Aspen) are 

 reputed to have been accursed and to have shuddered and trembled 

 ever after on account of their connecftion with the tragedy of 

 Calvary ; while others are said to have undergone a similar doom 

 because they were attainted by the suicide of the traitor Judas 

 Iscariot. 



Seeing that the reverence and worship paid to trees by the 

 ignorant and superstitious people was an institution impossible to 

 uproot, the early Christian Church sought to turn it to account, 

 and therefore consecrated old and venerated trees, built shrines 

 beneath their shade, or placed on their trunks crucifixes and 

 images of the Blessed Virgin. Legends connecfting trees with holy 

 personages, miracles, and sacred subje(fts were, in after years, freely 

 disseminated; one of the most remarkable being the marvellous 

 history of the Tree of Adam, in which it is sought to connecft the 

 Tree of Paradise with the Tree of Calvary. Evelyn summarises 

 this misty tradition in the following sentence : — " Trees and woods 

 have twice saved the whole world : first, by the Ark, then by the 

 Cross ; making full amends for the evil fruit of the tree in Paradise 

 by that which was borne on the tree in Golgotha." In course of 

 time the flowers and plants which the ancients had dedicated to 

 their pagan deities were transferred by the Christian Church to 

 the shrines of the Virgin and sainted personages ; this is especially 

 noticeable in the plants formerly dedicated to Venus and Freyja, 

 which, as being the choicest as well as the most popular, became, 

 in honour of the Virgin Mary, Our Lady's plants. Vast numbers 

 of flowers were in course of time appropriated by the Church, 

 and consecrated to her saints and martyrs — the seledtion being 

 governed generally by the facft that the flower bloomed on or 

 about the day on which the Church celebrated the saint's feast. 

 These appropriations enabled the Roman Catholics to compile a 

 complete calendar of flowers for every day in the year, in which 

 each flower is dedicated to a particular saint. 



