As one morn upon the hallowed steps, Bowed now with years, they stood, and to a knot Of wondering hearers told the Temple’s tale, Surprised each saw the other’s figure change And sprout with sudden verdure: and, as round Their forms the rapid foliage spread, while yet They could, one mutual fond “Farewell” they took, One kiss, and o’er their faces closed the bark, And both in trees were hidden! Still the boughs That interlacing link the neighbour trunks Tyana’s peasant loves to show:—the tale Her gravest elders—men not like to lie, As wherefore should they lie?—with serious faith Attested to these ears. The honoured boughs Myself have seen with garlands decked, myself One garland added more.[171] In many cases metamorphosis legends were attached to particular kinds of trees, thereby no doubt reinforcing the reverence and affection with which they were regarded. The Greek name for the almond tree, “Phylla,” recalled the fate of Phyllis, the beautiful Thracian, who hanged herself in despair when she thought Demophoon had deserted her, and was changed by the gods into one of these trees. Shortly afterwards the truant lover returned, heard the sorrowful tidings, visited the tree, and embraced it with tears. Then suddenly its branches, which till then had remained bare, burst forth into blossom and verdure, as if to show how joyfully conscious they were of the beloved’s return. Melus, priest of Aphrodite, filled with grief at the death of his foster-son Adonis, hanged himself, and was changed by the goddess he served into an apple-tree, from which time forward the apple came to be regarded as the most acceptable gift that a lover could offer at her shrine. Lotis, a beautiful nymph, pursued by Priapus, threw herself on the mercy of the gods, and by them was changed into the lotus-tree. The pine-tree, into which Cybele, in a moment of anger, had changed her lover and devotee, Attis, owed its perennial verdure to the compassion of Zeus for her remorse. The pomegranate was connected in tradition with a certain maid whom Dionysus loved, and the crown-like form of its blossom was accounted for by the story that the god, before he changed her into a tree, had promised her that she should one day wear a crown. The frankincense-tree owed its virtue to the nectar and ambrosia scattered by Apollo on the tomb of Leucothea, who had secured his love, and in consequence had been buried alive at the instance of her rival, Clytia. The tree grew from her grave, and Clytia, pining away in turn from grief, was changed into a plant whose blossoms were destined henceforth, like our sunflower, perpetually to confront the sun, her faithless lover.