OF SCRIPTUJIE. 
107 
that tree, to pain yet comfort the wanderers 
of the ocean ; for, 
* There is mercy in every place ; 
And mercy, encouraging thought, 
Lends even affliction a grace, 
And reconciles man to his lot.' " 
Pp. 140—146. 
Here there is little room for speculation. 
In the article Cedar there is much interest, 
particularly as there are some remarks on the 
decline of the number on Mount Lebanon, 
partly from time, and partly, indeed chiefly, from 
the destructive hands of man. It would ap- 
pear, there are hardly a score left. In another 
article, the Holm of Scripture is said to be 
our Turkish oak. The author says — 
" I was for some time doubtful what tree is 
the Holm of our version of the Bible. But 
I find that Gerard gives that name to the 
rough-acorned oak, which some call Turkish 
oak now-a-days; and that Dr. Phineas Hol- 
land, in his translation of Pliny's Natural 
History, says decidedly, b. xxiv. c. 4, that 
the Great Holm Oak is the Quercus Cerris ; 
and, in b. xvi. c. 6, he says of the fruit of 
the Quercus Cerris, 'clad it is with a cup 
beset with sharp prickles ;' which answers, not 
only to Gerard's description and cut, but to 
the specimen brought to me by a countryman 
as the Holm Oak, and which I have drawn 
from the branch itself. 
" Now, as our authorized version was pub- 
lished very little after Holland's translation 
and the Great Herbal, it seems next to cer- 
tain that, in our version of the story of 
Susannah, the word rendered Holm is really 
the Quercus Cerris. It is a native of Asia 
Minor, Syria, Palestine, the hilly parts of 
Persia, and onwards to Cabool, if not beyond; 
therefore it might well be one of the orna- 
ments of Susannah's garden, where it would 
find few rivals in the stateliness of its growth, 
or the beauty of its foliage."— Pp. 204, 205. 
The article Ivy is interesting, though only 
once mentioned in Scripture. The Lily, as 
may be supposed, occupies a conspicuous place. 
We have the figure of Lilium Candidum, or 
ordinary garden White Lily, to precede ; and 
the author says — 
" This most lovely flower is a native of 
Palestine, where it adorns the valleys with its 
beauty, and perfumes them with its fragrance. 
Indeed, the land itself has sometimes been called 
Phaselida, because it so abounded in lilies. 
'•' We read in the books of Kings and of 
Chronicles, that the artists who decorated 
Solomon's temple chose the lily for the capi- 
tals of the pillars ; and, moreover, that the 
great cistern, or molten sea, had its edges 
wrought like the brim of a cup, with flowers 
of lilies — a due homage paid to the loveliness 
of the queen of the valleys of Palestine. 
" The Lily of Solomon's Song, in those 
passages in the second chapter, ' I am the ra e 
of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys,' and 
'As the lily among thorns, so is my beloved,' 
should be translated jonquil, according to 
Sprengel, after the most ancient Chaldee and 
Arabic versions ; and, as the jonquil narcis- 
sus, and others of the Lily 'family, abound 
in Palestine, it is not surprising that the 
poet king should have varied the sweets to 
which he compared his beloved." — Pp. 244, 
245. 
Why it should have been translated jonquil 
we do not know, nor are we informed, except 
that Sprengel said so ; but we have a second 
figure, Narcissus Calathinus, to which is 
appended the name of " Solomon's Lily." 
This is somewhat speculative. If the author 
gives the Lilium Candidum as her own version 
of Solomon's Lily, and the Narcissus Cala- 
thinus as Sprengel's, we can understand it. 
Of course there are many texts quoted — for, 
like the fig, the lily is frequently men- 
tioned — but after many others, the author 
says : " But all these poetical passages in 
the Old Testament shrink into nothing before 
the exquisite simile in the Sermon on the 
Mount, where Jesus says, ' Consider the lilies 
of the field, how they grow : they toil not, 
neither do they spin : and yet I say unto 
you, that even Solomon, in all his glory, was 
not arrayed like one of these.'' At the moment 
of speaking, the Saviour was seated on Mount 
Tabor, which is still a flowery hill ; and 
looking over fertile plains to sheltered valleys, 
where the lily springs up at every step ; so 
that his hearers had only to look on either 
hand to the beautiful and stately flower, and 
behold its purity of colour and delicacy of 
texture, far exceeding all human workman- 
ship, even for a monarch's wear. When such is 
the fitness, the propriety of the simile di- 
vinely spoken in that place, I can scarcely 
comprehend the anxiety to displace the reading 
of the Testament, and substitute every and 
any thing for the lily of Palestine." In all 
this our author favours the adoption of the 
Narcissus Calathinus, as the Lily of Solomon, 
and seems, in another passage, to be half 
angry with others for disputing it ; and she 
says, in conclusion, " Salt's Scarlet Amaryllis, 
from Abyssinia, Le Vaillant's Giant Lily, 
from the desert of Africa, nay, even the fetid 
Crown Imperial, have, in turns, been pro- 
posed ; but each and all ought surely to be 
rejected in favour of the true White Lily of 
Palestine." The Eev. Mr. Cunningham, when 
once rebuking the cavillers who found texts 
in the Scriptures which they could not quite 
understand, and fixed upon them as difficulties 
which they wanted reconciled, said, "Why 
should we pick thorns when we are mercifully 
