PLANT-LORE OF SHAKESPEARE 
170 
is mentioned in the early vocabularies, and the author of “ The 
Flower and the Leaf” gives it a very prominent place in his 
description of a beautiful garden—• 
11 1 was aware of the fairest Medler tree 
That ever yet in alle my life I sie, 
As ful of blossomes as it might be ; 
Therein a goldfinch leaping pretile 
Fro’ bough to bough, and as him list, he eet 
Here and there of buddes and floweres sweet”—240, 
And certainly a fine Medlar tree “ful of blossomes” is a 
handsome ornament on any lawn. There are few deciduous 
trees that make better lawn trees. There is nothing stiff about 
the growth even from its early youth; it forms a low, irregular, 
picturesque tree, excellent for shade, with very handsome white 
flowers, followed by the curious fruit; it will not, however, do 
well in the North of England or Scotland. 
It does not seem to have been a favourite fruit with our 
forefathers. Bullein says “ the fruite called the Medler is used 
for a medicine and not for meate; ” and Shakespeare only used 
the common language of his time when he described the Medlar 
as only fit to be eaten when rotten. Chaucer said just the 
same— 
‘ ‘ That ilke fruyt is ever lenger the wers 
Till it be rote in mullok or in stree—• 
We olde men, I drede, so fare we, 
Till we be roten, can we not be rype .”—The Reeves Tale . 
And many other writers to the same effect. But, in fact, the 
Medlar when fit to be eaten is no more rotten than a ripe 
Peach, Pear, or Strawberry, or any other fruit which we do not 
eat till it has reached a certain stage of softness. There is a 
vast difference between a ripe and a rotten Medlar, though it 
would puzzle many of us to say when a fruit (not a Medlar 
only) is ripe, that is, fit to be eaten. These things are matters 
of taste and fashion, and it is rather surprising to find that we 
are accused, and by good judges, of eating Peaches when rotten 
rather than ripe. “The Japanese always eat their Peaches in 
