



THE IVY. 



In selecting trees for its support, our plant is as universal as in respect of 

 soil, and yet in the same manner partial and peculiar. Any kind of tree may be 

 clothed with ivy, and we do find it climbing up the red stem of the Scotch fir, 

 with facility equal to its tracery of lace-like leafage on the silvery bole of the 

 beech. But as it haunts woodlands and limestone countries chiefly, so it is partial 

 to deciduous trees, and usually avoids evergreens of all kinds, and conifers in par- 

 ticular. The resinous bark of the pine or cedar may be distasteful to its teeth, 

 but the heavy shade of these trees is sufficient to account for the absence of ivy 

 from them ; for, though the subdued light of the wood suits it well, the plant 

 cannot thrive in the darkness it would have to grope through in making its way 

 up the stem of a thrifty spruce or cedar. Its favourite trees are the oak and the 

 elm, and in the eastern counties it is a constant companion of the hedgerow oaks 

 and elms, displaying upon their rugged bark wreaths of glossy green or golden 

 leafage, for the delight of the observant pedestrian. 



Shakspere has this partiality in mind, where, in the " Midsummer Night's 

 Dream," Titania makes sportive love to "sweet Bully Bottom" as he stretches 

 his corpulent frame in listless abandonment on the green sward, and the fairy 



queen says : 



" Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms. 

 Fairies begone, and be all Vays away. 

 So doth the woodbine and the sweet honeysuckle 

 Gently entwist ; the female ivy so 

 Enrings the barky fingers of the elm." 1 



1 Act IV. s. 1. In Knight's "Pictorial Shakspere" (Comedies, I. 368) occurs the following 

 note : " According to Stevens, ' the sweet honeysuckle ' is an explanation of what the poet 

 means by * the woodbine,' which name was sometimes applied to the ivy. ' The honeysuckle ' 

 doth entwist ' the female ivy ' enrings ' the barky fingers of the elm.' Upon this interpreta- 

 tion the lines would thus be printed : 



" ' So doth the woodbine, the sweet honeysuckle, 

 Gently entwist the female ivy so 

 Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.' " 



This is certainly very different from the usual Shakespearian construction. Nor is our poet 

 fond of expletives. If the word " elm" is the only plant entwisted and enringed, we have only 

 one image. But if the woodbine is not meant to be identical with the " honeysuckle," we have 

 two images, each distinct, and each beautiful. Gifford pointed out the true meaning of the 

 passage, in his note upon a parallel passage in Ben Jonson : 



" Behold 



How the blue bindweed doth itself enfold 



1 



