214 SYLVA BOOK ii 



CHAPTER II. 



Of the P/afanus, Lofus, Cornus, Acacia^ &c. 



i. Platanus^ that so beautiful and precious tree, 

 anciently sacred to * Helena, (and with which she 

 crown'd the Lar, and Genius of the place) was so 

 doated on by Xerxes, that ^lian and other authors 

 tell us, he made halt, and stopp'd his prodigious army 

 of seventeen hundred thousand soldiers, which even 

 cover'd the sea, exhausted rivers, and thrust mount 

 Athos from the Continent, to admire the pulcritude 

 and procerity of one of these goodly trees ; and became 

 so fond of it, that spoiling both himself, his concub- 

 ines, and great persons of all their jewels, he cover'd 

 it with gold, gems, neck-laces, scarfs and bracelets, 

 and infinite riches : In sum, was so enamour'd of it, 

 that for some days, neither the concernment of his 

 Grand Expedition, nor interest of honour, nor the 

 necessary motion of his portentous army, could per- 

 swade him from it : He styl'd it his mistress, his 

 minion, his Goddess ; and when he was forc'd to part 

 from it, he caus'd the figure of it to be stamp'd in a 

 medal of gold, which he continually wore about him. 

 Where-ever they built their sumptuous and magni- 

 ficent colleges for the exercise of youth in gymnastics, 

 as riding, shooting, wrestling, running, &c. (like to 

 our French Academies) and where the graver philo- 

 sophers also met to converse together, and improve 

 their studies, betwixt the Xista, and subdiales ambula- 

 tiones (which were portico's open to the air) they 



1 Euripides epithai. 



