58 THE BEECH. 



ever, now she writes him one of those tender and 

 moving epistles which Ovid has preserved for us as 

 the "Letters of the Heroines/' reminding him of 

 the happy days when they were partakers in the 

 same amusements, and when he had been used to 

 carve her name on the bark of trees. 



" Incisae servant a te mea nomina fagi ; 



Et legor (Enone falce notata tuS. 

 Et quantum trunci, tantum mea nomina crescunt ; 

 Crescite, et in titulos surgite recta meos ! " 



" The beeches still preserve my name, carved by 

 your hand, and ' CEnone,' the work of your pruning- 

 knife, is read upon their bark. As the trunks in- 

 crease, the letters still dilate ; they grow and rise 

 as testimonies of my just claim upon your love ! " 

 If the remembrance of these soft moments could 

 not recall to her his wandering affection, how little, 

 she expresses in this simple and pathetic allusion, 

 can she hope to recover it in any other way. The 

 poplar was used for the same purpose in ancient 

 times, as we may gather from the lines which follow : 

 "There grows a poplar," she continues, "by the 

 river-side (ah, I well remember it !), on which is 

 carved the motto of our love. Flourish, thou pop- 

 lar ! fed by the bordering stream, whose furrowed 

 bark bears this inscription, * Sooner shall Xanthus 

 return to his source, than Paris be able to live with- 

 out CEnone.' " By comparison, these things are 

 trifles ; to some they may seem silly, and not worth 



