MALLOW. 267 



" me pascunt olivae, 



Me cichorea, levesque malvje." 



" Olives, succory, and light mallows are my food." 

 He commends them also as being very salutary : 



" Malvse salubres corpori." 



We are informed that a tree of the Mallow kind furnishes 

 food to the Egyptians, and the Chinese also use Mallows in 

 their food. 



Job speaks of them as being eaten in times of famine : 



" For want and famine they were solitary : fleeing into the wilder- 

 ness in former time desolate and waste : 



" Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper-roots for their 

 meat'." 



A kind' of paste, called by the French name of pate de 

 mauve, was prepared from the root, which is thought to be 

 efficacious in allaying the irritation produced by violent 

 coughing ; but at present the Mallow is omitted, that the 

 composition may have a fine white colour ; it is therefore 

 now made only of the finest white gum-arabic, the white of 

 eggs, sugar, and orange-flower water. 



The Mallow was formerly planted, with some other 

 flowers, the asphodel in particular, around the graves of 

 departed friends -f-. It was probably this circumstance which 

 led to the following reflections, in the epitaph on Bion, by 

 Moschus : 



' ' Raise, raise the dirge, Muses of Sicily ! 

 Alas ! when mallows in the garden die, 

 Green parsley, or the crisp luxuriant dill, 

 They live again, and flower another year ; 

 But we, how great soe'er, or strong, or wise, 

 When once we die, sleep in the senseless earth, 

 A long, an endless, unawakeable sleep." 



HUNT'S FOLIAGE. 



* Job, chap. xxx. verses 3, 4. 

 t See Asphodel. 



