310 SYLVA FLORIFERA. 



" And brfdes, as delicate and fair 



As the white jasmine flowers they wear, 

 Hath Yemen in her blissful clime." 



T. MOORE. 



The common jasmine, Officinale, which grows 

 naturally at Malabar, is registered in the 

 Hortus Kewensis as a native of the South of 

 Europe ; but we are opinion that it did not 

 leave the East until the taking of Constanti- 

 nople by the Turks, whose fondness for flow- 

 ers would induce them to transport it to the 

 land they conquered in 1453. It certainly 

 would not have passed unnoticed by Pliny 

 and other ancient authors, had it either 

 grown naturally, or been introduced to that 

 country previous to their time. Dioscorides 

 is the only Greek author that notices it ; and 

 as he has given no description of the plant or 

 flower, but only tells us that the Persians ob- 

 tained an oil from a white flower, with which 

 they perfumed their apartments during their 

 repasts, it is probable he only became ac- 

 quainted with the oil of jasmine during his 

 attendance as physician on Antony and Cleo- 

 patra, in Egypt, whose unbounded luxury 

 would naturally call this essence from the land 

 of odours. This author calls it laa-ftivw, from 

 I'ov (viola], and oa-^vt (odor], on account of its 

 fragrance ; and from whence the name of Jas- 



14 



