An
owl in an Ivy bush," as "perhaps denoting originally the union of wisdom
or prudence with conviviality, as 'Be merry and wise.'"--NARES.

The Ivy was a plant as much admired by our grandfathers of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries as it is now by us. Spenser was evidently fond
of it--

"And nigh thereto a little chappel stoode
Which being all with Yvy overspread
Deckt all the roofe, and shadowing the rode
Seem'd like a grove faire branched over hed."

_F. Q._, vi, v, 25.

In another place he speaks of it as--

"Wanton Yvie, flouring fayre."--_F. Q._, ii, v, 29.

And in another place--

"Amongst the rest the clambering Ivie grew
Knitting his wanton armes with grasping hold,
Least that the Poplar happely should rew
Her brother's strokes, whose boughs she doth enfold
With her lythe twigs till they the top survew,
And paint with pallid greene her buds of gold."

VIRGIL'S _Gnat_.

Chaucer describes it as--

"The erbe Ivie that groweth in our yard that mery is."

And in the same poem he prettily describes it as--

"The pallid Ivie building his own bowre."

As a wild plant, the Ivy is found in Europe, Asia, and Africa, but not
in America, and wherever it is found it loves to cover old walls and
buildings, and trees of every sort, with its close and rich drapery and
clusters of black fruit,[132:1] and where it once establishes itself it
is always beautiful, but not always harmless. Both on trees and
buildings it requires very close watching. It will very soon destroy
soft-wooded trees, such as the Poplar and the Ash, by its tight embrace,
not by sucking out the sap, but by preventing the outward growth of the
shoots, and checking--and at length preventing--the flow of sap; and in
buildings it is no doubt beneficial as long as it is closely watched and
kept in place, but if allowed to drive its roots into joints, or to grow
under roofs, the swelling roots and branches will soon displace any
masonry, and cause immense mischief.

We have only one species of Ivy in England, and there are only two real
species recognized by present botanists, but there are infinite
varieties, and many of them very beautiful. These variegated Ivies were
known to the Greeks and Romans, and were highly prized by them, one
especially with white fruit (at present