Trees, Shrubs, and Plants of Virgil 



speaks of ' roscida poma ' (I. xx. 36) he seems to mean 

 fruits splashed by the fountain into which Hylas was 

 drawn by the nymphs. 



Of the phrase in Ec. ii. 51, ' cana legam tenera 

 lanugine mala,' it is difficult to make anything. The 

 editors say quinces, but this ignores ' cana.' There 

 were, however, three varieties of the quince, and one 

 of these may have had a more hoary skin than the 

 chrysomela. Our own pear-shaped fruit has a lighter 

 skin than the apple-shaped and the Portuguese 

 varieties, both cultivated in this country. The 

 peach, which Virgil's description might suit, seems 

 to have been of later introduction. 



C. Citron : Citrus medica (Ge. ii. 126-135). 



The Latin name for the citron was usually Malus 

 medica and sometimes Malus Persica, a use which 

 has caused some confusion with the peach. Virgil's 

 account of it is his one attempt to describe from 

 literary sources a tree of which he can have seen 

 only the imported fruit. The tree is of Persian 

 origin, and one variety of it is well known as the 

 West Indian lime, of which Mrs. Soorocks gave one 

 withered specimen to Bailie Waft. Virgil took most 

 of his description from Theophrastus, but adds one 

 or two touches whose origin I have failed to trace. 

 Moreover, his text had one corrupt word, which is 

 correct in the extant manuscripts, but corrupted in 

 some which were seen by Athenaeus, who mistook 

 the corrupt for the correct. 



The points which Virgil takes from Theophrastus 



76 



