BAY. 53 



1 " from her majestic brow 



She tore the laurel, and she tore the bay." 



THOMSON'S BRITANNIA. 



The Bay not only served to grace triumphant brows, 

 mortal and immortal, but was also placed over the houses 

 of sick persons, from some superstitious notion of its 

 efficacy. It adorned the gates of the Caesars and high 

 pontiffs. It was worn by the priestess of Delphi, who 

 chewed some of the leaves and threw them on the sacred 

 fire. Letters and dispatches sent from a victorious ge- 

 neral to the senate, were wrapped in Bay-leaves; the 

 spears, tents, ships, &c. were all dressed up with them ; 

 and, in the triumph, every common soldier carried a 

 branch in his hand. 



The Bay was in great esteem with the physicians, who 

 considered it as a panacea. The statue of Esculapius, 

 though perhaps with an allusion also to his father Apollo 

 (who was the god of physic in general, as his son seems 

 to have been of its practitioners), was adorned with its 

 leaves. From the custom that prevailed in some places 

 of crowning the young doctors in physic with this Laurel 

 in berry (Bacca-lauri), the students were called Bacca- 

 laureats, Bay-laureats, or Bachelors. The term has, with 

 some propriety, been extended to single men, as the male 

 and female berries do not grow on the same plant ; and it 

 seems we might with equal correctness bestow the name 

 upon unmarried ladies. 



The decay of the Bay-tree was formerly considered by 

 the superstitious as an omen of disaster. It is said that 

 before the death of Nero, though in a very mild winter, 

 all these trees withered to the root, (yet surely his death 

 was no serious disaster!) and that a great pestilence in 

 Padua was preceded by the same phenomenon. The 

 Laurel had so great a reputation for clearing the air and 



