LOTUS. 357 



trees there growing, which the Latins call Luc us, the 

 goddess Diana took her name Lucina, which was about 

 four hundred and fifty years back, and doubtless this 

 tree is so old." 



" Another lote-tree there is," says he, " still older, but 

 the age of it is likewise uncertain : it is known by the 

 name of Capillata (hairy), and so called, because the hair 

 of the vestal virgins' heads is usually brought thither to 

 be consecrated. There is a third lotus at Rome, in the 

 court-yard and cloister about the temple of Vulcan, which 

 Romulus built for a perpetual monument and memorial 

 of a victory, and defrayed the charge out of the tenth of 

 the pillage and spoil that he obtained from his enemies; 

 and this tree is at least as old as the city of Rome." 



Pliny writes on the medicinal qualities of the lotus, 

 in his 24th book, chap. 2, and says his countrymen called 

 it the Greek bean. He says the fruit is sweet, but that 

 nothing is more bitter than the shavings of the wood. 



Mr. Mungo Park discovered what is supposed to be 

 the lotus of the ancients, and says it abounds in all parts 

 of the interior of Africa. Agreeably to his account, it 

 is rather a thorny shrub than a tree. The fruit is a small 

 farinaceous berry, which being pounded and dried in the 

 sun, is made into excellent cakes, resembling in flavour 

 and colour the sweetest gingerbread. This traveller ob- 

 serves, that a sweet liquor is obtained from the lotus, 

 which, we may conclude, was reputed to possess the be- 

 witching qualities described by the ancients. 



Desfontaines states, in the Journal de Physique, Octo- 

 ber 1788, that the lotus of the ancients is a shrub, a 

 species of the wild jujube-tree, which grows in several 

 parts of Barbary. 



A species of the lotus, or nettle-tree, celtis, has long 

 been cultivated in this country: as Gerard says, " this is 

 a rare and strange tree in both the Germanics : it was 



