pPanC iQorc, "Isegc^/, and. ISLjric/, 311 



possess similar properties to the Mezereon. It is called Ty-ved in 

 Denmark, and is sacred to Tyr, the Scandinavian god of war. 



It is the badge of the Highland (irahams. The Flax-leaved 



Daphne, called by Gerarde the Mountain Widow-Wayle, is sup- 

 posed to be the herb Casia, mentioned by Virgil and other Roman 

 writers; the Cneoron of the Greeks. 



DATE.— The Date Palm {Phanix daciylifeya) is the Palm of 

 tiie Oases, and supplies not only food for man and beast, but a 

 variety of useful commodities. This Palm has plume-like leaves, 

 and grows from sixty to eighty feet high, living to a great age, and 

 providing yearly a large crop of fruit. The male and female 

 flowers are borne on separate trees, and it is remarkable that there 

 is a difference in the frucftification of the wild Date and the culti- 

 vated, though both are the same species. The wild Dates impreg- 

 nate themselves, but the cultivated trees do not, without the assist- 

 ance of art. Pontanus, an Italian poet of the fifteenth century, 

 gives a glowing description of a female Date-tree which had stood 

 lonely and barren, near Otranto, until at length a favouring wind 

 wafted towards it tlie pollen of a male that grew at a distance of 

 fifteen leagues. Father Labat has told of a Date-tree that grew 

 in the island of Martinico, and produced fruit which was much 

 esteemed; but when an increase of the number of Date-trees was 

 wanted, not one could be reared from the seed, and they had to 

 send to Africa for Dates, the stones of which grew readily and 

 produced abundantly. The Date Palm is so abundant in the 

 country between the States of Barbary and the desert (which 

 produces no other kind of tree), that this region is designated as 



the Land of Dates {Bileditlgerid). The Palm of Palestine is the 



Date Palm. When the sacred writers wished to describe the 

 majesty and beauty of redtitude, they appealed to the Palm as the 

 fittest emblem which they could seledl. "He shall grow up and 

 flourish like the Palm-tree " is the promise of David to the just. 

 Mahomet, like the Psalmist of Israel, was wont to compare the 

 virtuous and generous man to the Date-tree: — "He stands erecft 

 before his Lord; in every acflion he follows the impulse received 

 from above; and his whole life is devoted to the welfare of his 



fellow-creatures." The inhabitants of Medina, who possess the 



most extensive plantations of Date-trees, say that their prophet 

 caused a tree at once to spring from the kernel at his command, 

 and to stand before his admiring followers in mature fruitfulness 

 and beauty. The Tamanaquas of South America have a tradi- 

 tion that the human race sprang again from the fruits of the Date 



Palm after the Mexican age of water. The Arabs say that 



when Adam was driven out of Paradise, the Date, the chief of all 

 fruits, was one of the three things which he took with him ; the 



other two being the Myrtle and an ear of Wheat. A popular 



legend concerning the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt, 

 narrates how a Date Palm, at the command of the child Jesus, 



