BAY. 



(Sweet Bay.) 

 LAURINE^E. Laurus Nolilis. 



(Oleander.) Nerlum. 



E green bay attains the height of a small tree or 

 large shrub, with healthy-looking, dark-green leaves. 

 &amp;gt; It is not generally met with throughout the land, but 

 flourishes in some places where the soil is rich, espe 

 cially in the old gardens of Tyre and Sidon. Notwith 

 standing the supposition that the above is perhaps the &quot; green 

 bay-tree&quot; referred to in the 37th Psalm and 35th verse, yet a 

 &quot;green tree that groweth in its native soil,&quot; or, simply, a &quot;flou 

 rishing plant,&quot; might be the signification of the word translated 

 &quot;green bay-tree&quot; in that verse; and the celebrated botanist 

 Hasselquist noticed, as every one who has travelled through 

 Judea has also, that the oleander or nerium, called the rose-bay, 

 flourishes throughout the land and especially by the water 

 courses. Hasselquist was the first to suppose that the oleander 

 was the plant referred to as the green bay-tree, springing up in 

 crowds along the damp banks or overhanging the rivulets. 

 It mingles with the tamarisk and willow upon the sides of the 

 Jordan and the shores of Lake Tiberias, and gives life and 

 beauty to many a rugged rock on the Mediterranean. 



It is supposed that the &quot;bay-tree,&quot; or oleander, is alluded to 



