NATURE IN MOTION. 55 



is now utterly sterile. The spoiler is fallen upon her 

 summer fruit and her vintage ; joy and gladness are taken 

 from the plentiful field, and her plants are gone over 

 the sea. Our common clover has distinctly marked its 

 travelling-stations; requiring much moisture, it left Greece 

 when her plains were scorched and withered ; Italy could 

 not hold it, after repeated devastations, when it made its 

 way into Southern Germany; from thence it is even now 

 gradually wandering towards the moister regions of the 

 North. No Pythagoras need forbid his disciples now the 

 use of the bean, for Egypt is no longer able to produce 

 it. The wine of Mareotis also, that inspired the guests 

 of Cleopatra, and whose praises Horace has sung in such 

 graceful verses, grows no more. The conscience-stricken 

 murderer would find no shelter, in our day, in the pine- 

 forests of Poseidon, where to lie in wait for the guests 

 that wandered joyfully to the great festivals of Greece; 

 the pines have long since left the plain, with its hot, dry 

 climate, and moved up to the cooler mountains. 



It need hardly be added, that all the finer fruits, also, 

 have come to us from the East. The precious grape, 

 the cooling cherry, the pomegranate and the peach, in fine 

 all the luscious gifts of Autumn, we owe to the Orient. 

 Italy is not originally 



" The land where the lemon-tree blows, 

 In darker leaves bowered the gold orange glows," 



for Seville oranges and lemons came to Europe only 

 through the Arabs. The latter are not even found on 

 the walls of Pompeii, and the common orange, which is 



