Trees, Shrubs, and Plants of Virgil 



withstand much drought. It is still cultivated in 

 Italy in dry and hilly fields. It will be remembered 

 that it is one of the six components of the bread 

 of which, according to Ezekiel (iv. 9), the Israelites 

 were to eat for three hundred and ninety days. 



Italian name, Miglio. 



Morus. 



' sanguineis frontem mods et tempora pingit ' (Ec. vi. 22). 



The black mulberry (Morus nigra) is an Asiatic 

 tree, which was early in cultivation, and may well be 

 the tree in whose tops King David was to hear the 

 sound of marching. It came into England in the 

 reign of Edward VI. The colour of the berries is 

 near enough to that of blood to justify Virgil's epithet, 

 and indeed is ascribed by Ovid to the blood of 

 Pyramus, who killed himself under a mulberry, as 

 he does in A Midsummer-Night's Dream. 



The word ' morum ' is applied to other like berries, 

 such as the blackberry. In modern Italy the name 

 of ' moro ' has been transferred to the white mul- 

 berry, whose fruit is a very pale red. This was a 

 tree of later introduction, but is now much the more 

 common in Italy. It is planted as food for silk- 

 worms, and in some parts of Emilia, perhaps also 

 elsewhere, it supports the vine. 



Flower, April and May. 

 Italian name, Moro. 



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