324 pPant Tsorc, "bege'r^b/, anil "bijrie/, 



spreading shady tree, it is selecfted by Virgil (^n. vi.) as the 

 roosting-place of dreams in gloomy Orcus : — 



" Full in the midst a spreading Elm displayed 

 His aged arms, and cast a mighty shade ; 

 Each trembling leaf with some light visions teems, 

 And heaves impregnated with airy dreams." 



It was in connetftion with the title of Tree of Dreams (Ulmus 

 Somnorum), that the Elm became, like the Oak, a prophetic tree. 



On the Continent, an Elm is often found on the village-green, 



beneath whose boughs justice used formerly to be administered, 

 and meetings held: there was one at Gisors, on the frontier of 

 Normandy, where the kings of France and Dukes of Normandy 

 used to hold conference together, and which was large enough to 

 shelter both their trains; this tree was upwards of two hundred 

 years old when cut down by order of Kmg Philippe Auguste, out 

 of hatred to our Plantagenet kings. One of the oldest Elms in 

 England is a stump at Richmond, now fenced in, and covered 

 with Ivy, which was planted by Queen Elizabeth herself, and has 



on that account always been known as the Queen's Elm. 



Formerly the leafing of the Elm was made to regulate both field 

 and garden work, as seen in the following rustic rhyme: — 



" When the Elmen leaf is as big as a mouse's ear, 

 Then to sow Barley never fear. 

 When the Elmen leaf is as big as an ox's eye, 

 Then say I, ' Hie, boys, hie f ' " 



In olden times, the falling of the leaves of an Elm was thought to 

 prognosticate a murrain. In Sicily, they have a custom of binding 

 the trunk of a Fig-tree with branches of Elm, from a belief that 

 that they would prevent the young Figs from falling before they be- 

 came thoroughly ripe. The Elm is held to be under the influence 



of Saturn. "The Seven Sisters" was the name bestowed on 



seven Elm-trees at Tottenham, which gave the name to the road 

 from thence to Upper Holloway. In Bedwell's History of Tot- 

 tenham, written in the year 1631, he describes Page Green by the 

 side of the high road at that village, and a group of Elms in a circle, 

 with a Walnut in the centre. He says : " This tree hath this 

 many yeares stod there, and it is observed yearely to live and 

 beare leavs, and yet to stand at a stay, that is, to growe neither 

 greater or higher. This people do commonly tell the reason to bee, 

 for that there was one burnt upon that place for the profession of 

 the Gospell." There was also a connedting link between the 

 Walnut-tree and the Seven Sisters, by which it was surrounded. 

 There were seven Elms planted by seven sisters respetftively. The 

 tree planted by the smallest of the sisters was always irregular and 

 stunted in growth. There was an eighth sister who planted an Elm 

 in the midst of the other seven, and the legend relates that it 

 withered and died when she died, and that then a Walnut-tree grew 



