Latin Texts & Translations

Asia, too, produces the tragos ^[Note] or scorpio, a thorny shrub, destitute of leaves, with red clusters upon it that are employed in medicine. Italy produces the myrica, which some persons call the "tamarix;" ^[Note] and Achaia, the wild brya, ^[Note] remarkable for the circumstance that it is only the cultivated kind that bears a fruit, not unlike the gall-nut. In Syria and Egypt this plant is very abundant. It is to the trees of this last country that we give the name of "unhappy;" ^[Note] but yet those of Greece are more unhappy still, for that country produces the tree known as "ostrya," or, as it is sometimes called, "ostrya," ^[Note] a solitary tree that grows about rocks washed by the water, and very similar in the bark and branches to the ash. It re-

sembles the pear-tree in its leaves, which, however, are a little longer and thicker, with wrinkled indentations running down the whole length of the leaf. The seed of this tree resembles barley in form and colour. The wood is hard and solid; it is said, that if it is introduced into a house, it is productive of painful deliveries and of shocking deaths.