THE MYRTLE.
Among the Greeks and Romans, the oak was dedicated to Jupiter, the olive to Minerva, and the Myrtle, from the delicacy and beauty of its foliage, to Venus; and the temple of this goddess was surrounded by Myrtle groves. Hence the Myrtle and the rose have always been twined with garlands and prizes for beauty,—the one being admired for its flowers, the other for its delicate and aromatic leaves. A great deal of the romance of botany is lost to us, the inhabitants of the New World, on account of the absence from our woods of many of the plants most celebrated in classic poetry and medieval romance. We have not the heath, nor the olive, nor the ivy; and many of the humble flowers of the meadow, familiar to the reader of classical lore, are absent from our soil. Their absence, notwithstanding the beauty and elegance of many flowers and shrubs that seem to stand in the place of them, can never cease to be felt. The sacredness which a plant acquires by its association with ancient poetry and romance and with Holy Writ cannot be transferred to one of our indigenous plants of equal beauty. But there is romance in our own lives, and there are plants never mentioned in the literature of the romantic ages which are associated with certain hallowed periods and events in our youth that render them ever sacred to memory.
There are two or three plants in our own land that bear the classical name of Myrtle, not from any botanical resemblance or affinity to this plant, either in leaf or in flower, but from the aromatic odor of the leaves, like that of the true Myrtle. These plants are the Sweet-Gale, the bayberry, and the sweet-fern.