[2417] The Ligustrum vulgare of Linnæus. It has black fruit and a white flower, and is rendered famous by the lines of Virgil—Ecl. ii. 17:
“O formose puer, nimium ne crede colori;
Alba ligustra cadunt, vaccinia nigra leguntur.”
It is evidently this juxtaposition that has prompted Pliny to mention the vaccinium in the succeeding passage. In B. xii. c. [51], and B. xxiv. c. 45, Pliny seems inclined to confound this shrub with the Cyprus, the Lawsonia inermis of Linnæus, the Henna of the east, a totally different plant.
[2418] Wooden tallies used by public officers in keeping their accounts. They were employed till the middle ages.
[2419] The Primus mahaleb, Desfontaines says; but Fée identifies it with the black heath-berry, or whortle-berry, still called “vaciet” in France. It does not, however, grow, as Pliny says, in watery places, but in woods and on shrubby hills.
[2420] See B. xxi. c. 97.
[2421] These observations, Fée says, are borrowed from Theophrastus, Hist. Plant. B. iii. c. 4, and are founded on truth.
[2422] “Silvestres,” and “urbaniores.”
[2423] Urbanæ.