136 PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
(4) They have scared away two of my best sheep, which I fear the wolf will 
sooner find than the master ; if anywhere I have them ’tis by the 
seaside browsing of Ivy. 1 — Winter s Tale , iii, 3, 66. 
(5) His head’s yellow, 
Hard hayr’d, and curl’d, thicke twin’d like Ivy tops, 
Not to undoe with thunder.— Two Noble Kinsmen , iv. 2, 115. 
The rich evergreen of “ the Ivy never sear ” (Milton) recom¬ 
mended it to the Romans to be joined with the Bay in the 
chaplets of poets— 
11 Hanc sine tempora circurn 
Inter victrices Ilederam tibi serpere lauros.”— Virgil, 
Ci Seu condis amabile carmen 
Prima feres Hedeme victricis prsemia.”—H orace. 
And in mediaeval times it was used with Holly for Christmas 
decorations, so that Bullein called it “ the womens Christmas 
Herbe.” But the old writers always assumed a curious rivalry 
between the two—• 
“ Holly and Ivy made a great party 
Who should have the mastery 
In lands where they go.” 
And there is a well-known carol of the time of Henry VI, 
which tells of the contest between the two, and of the mastery 
of the Holly; it is in eight stanzas, of which I extract the last 
four— 
‘ ‘ Holly he hath berries as red as any Rose, 
The foresters, the hunters, keep them from the does ; 
Ivy she hath berries as black as any Sloe, 
There come the owls and eat them as they go; 
Holly he hath birds, a full fair flock, 
The nightingale, the popinjay, the gentle laverock ; 
Good Ivy, say to us, what birds hast thou? 
None but the owlet that cries ‘ How, how ! ’ ” 
1 Sheep feeding on Ivy—• 
“ My sheep have Honeysuckle bloom for pasture; Ivy grows 
In multitudes around them, and blossoms like the Rose.” 
Theocritus, Idyll v. ( Calverley ). 
“ Ivie. It is plentiful in giving milke wherwith the kids were more full 
ofmilke.”—M aplet, A Greene Forest, 1567, s. v. Iyie. 
