SHAKESPEARE’S GARDEN 
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of trees, the olive (Olea Europcea, L.), which is a 
native of the South of Europe, flowering in July, and 
introduced to us in 1570. Its fruit is well known, 
and as much appreciated to-day as in the sixteenth 
century. A good deal of this is no doubt due to its 
biblical lore, where it is ever set forth as the symbol 
of fatness, plenty, and honour — from the time the 
dove first brought back the olive leaf to expectant 
Noah (Gen. viii. 11) until the time when the Gentile 
Church was likened to a wild olive-tree grafted into 
the cultivated stem of the Jewish (Rom. xi. 17)— 
but a good deal is also due to the classical honour 
paid to it as the sacred emblem of Minerva, the gift, 
she believed, and rightly so, the most blessed offering 
to mankind, the symbol of Peace. Can we forget 
the great scene of contest carved by the matchless 
skill of Phidias high on the pediment of that most 
perfect of temples the Parthenon, the snorting war- 
horse of Neptune, the dignity of Athene Glaucopus 
and her gift ? All but two of the poet’s references 
are to the olive in this aspect. The exceptions are 
As You Like It, III. v. 74 : 
If you will know my house, 
’Tis at the tuft of olives here hard by. 
And again, IV. iii. 77: 
Where in the purlieus of this forest stands 
A sheep-cote fenced about with olive-trees. 
Ebony, the wood of Diospyros ebenum and various 
trees of the genera Ebenaster, Mabola, etc., was known 
to the poet only from hearsay; at least, he could 
not have seen the living tree, although the wood 
itself was imported from the East long before his 
time. It was well enough known' to ancient peoples, 
and prized for cabinet work, and the bed of sleep in 
his dark abode is said by Ovid to have been coprx- 
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