Chapter 465

2265These were the “boletus” and the “suillus” the last of which seem only to have been recently introduced at table in the time of Pliny. See B. xxii. c. 47.

2266He alludes clearly to fungi of radically different qualities, as the nature of the trees beneath which they grow cannot possibly influence them, any further than by the various proportions of shade they afford. The soil, however, exercises great influence on the quality of the fungus; growing upon a hill, it may be innoxious, while in a wet soil it may be productive of death.

2267See cc.93,94, and95, of this Book.

2268Works and Days, l. 230.

2269Pliny seems to have here taken in a literal sense, what has been said figuratively by Virgil, Ecl. iv. l. 26:“Et duræ quercus sudabunt roscida mella;”and by Ovid, in relation to the Golden Age, Met. i. 113:“Flavaque de viridi stillabant ilice mella.”Fée remarks, that we find on the leaf of the lime-tree a thin, sugary deposit, left by insects, and that a species of manna exudes from the Coniferæ, as also the bark of the beech. This, however, is never the case with the oak.

2269Pliny seems to have here taken in a literal sense, what has been said figuratively by Virgil, Ecl. iv. l. 26:

“Et duræ quercus sudabunt roscida mella;”

and by Ovid, in relation to the Golden Age, Met. i. 113:

“Flavaque de viridi stillabant ilice mella.”

Fée remarks, that we find on the leaf of the lime-tree a thin, sugary deposit, left by insects, and that a species of manna exudes from the Coniferæ, as also the bark of the beech. This, however, is never the case with the oak.

2270B. xi. c.12.

2271By this word, Fée observes, we must not understand the word “nitre,” in the modern sense, but the sub-carbonate of potash; while the ashes of trees growing on the shores of the sea produce a sub-carbonate of soda.

2272“Coccus.” This is not a gall, but the distended body of an insect, the kermes, which grows on a peculiar oak, the “Quercus coccifera,” found in the south of Europe.

2273We have previously mentioned, that he seems to have confounded the holly with the holm oak.

2274Poinsinet, rather absurdly, as it would appear, finds in this word the origin of our word “cochineal.”

2275The kermes berry is but little used in Spain, or, indeed, anywhere else, since the discovery of the cochineal of America.

2276B. ix. c. 65.

2277Not the white agaric, Fée says, of modern pharmacy; but, as no kind of agaric is found in the oak, it does not seem possible to identify it. See B. xxv. c. 57.

2278It is evident that no fungus would give out phosphoric light; but it may have resulted from old wood in a state of decomposition.

2279It is pretty clear that one of the lichens of the genususneais here referred to. Amadue, or German tinder, seems somewhat similar.

2280B. xii. c.50.

2281On the contrary, Fée says, the acorn of the Quercus suber is of a sweet and agreeable flavour, and is much sought as a food for pigs. The hams of Bayonne are said to owe their high reputation to the acorns of the cork-tree.

2282The word “cork” is clearly derived from the Latin “cortex,” “bark.” See Beckmann’s History of Inventions, V. i. p. 320,et seq.,Bohn’s Edition, for a very interesting account of this tree.

2283This passage, the meaning of which is so obvious, is discussed at some length by Beckmann, Vol. i. pp. 321, 322.

2284It is still employed for making soles which are impervious to the wet.

2285It is doubtful whether this name was given to the shoes, or the females who wore them, and we have therefore preserved the doubt, in the ambiguous “them.” Beckmann also discusses this passage, p. 321. He informs us, p. 322, that the Roman ladies who wished to appear taller than they really were, were in the habit of putting plenty of cork under their soles.

2286At the present day, it grows in the greatest abundance in France, the Landes more particularly.

2287This is still the case in some of the poorer provinces of Spain.

2288As Fée remarks, Mars is no longer the Divinity in honour of whom characters are traced on the bark of trees.

2289On the contrary. Fée says, the resinous woods are the most proof of all against the action of the air.

2290Festus says that the Fagutal, a shrine of Jupiter, was so called from a beech tree (fagus) that stood there, and was sacred to that god.

2291Or osier.

2292Or “plantation of the æsculus.”

2293A.U.C.367.

2294Fée regards this as an extremely doubtful assertion.

2295The Pinus pinea of Linnæus, the cultivated pine.

2296The Pinus silvestris of Linnæus, the wild pine; the Pinus maritima of Lamarck is a variety of it.

2297B. xv. c.9.

2298In c.23of this Book.

2299A variety of the Pinus silvestris of Linnæus.

2300“Liburnicæ.” See B. ix. cc. 5 and 48.

2301The Abies excelsa of Decandolle—thePesseorFaux sapin(false fir) of the French. This tree, however, has not the pectinated, or comb-like leaf, mentioned by Pliny in c.38.

2302It is still known in commerce as “false incense;” and is often sold as incense for the rites of the Roman church: while sometimes it is purposely employed, as being cheaper.

2303A great street in Capua, which consisted entirely of the shops of sellers of unguents and perfumes.

2304It has the same pyramidal form as the pitch-tree. It is still much used in ship-building, both for its resinous and durable qualities and the lightness of the wood.

2305The presence of resin isnotlooked upon as any defect in the fir at the present day. It produces what is known in commerce as “Strasbourg turpentine.”

2306The Abies larix of Linnæus, and the Larix Europæa, it is thought, of Decandolles.

2307It is the Venice turpentine of commerce. Each tree will furnish seven or eight pounds each year for half a century.

2308It is doubtful if the tæda, or torch-tree, has been identified. Some take it to be the Pinus mugho of Miller, the torch-pine of the French; others, again, suggest that it is the same as the Pinus cembro of the botanists.

2309So called from its resemblance to a fig. Fée says that there is little doubt that this pretended fruit was merely a resinous secretion, which hardens and assumes the form of a fig.

2310He somewhat mistranslates a passage of Theophrastus here, who, without transforming the larch into another tree, says that it is a sign of disease in the larch, when its secretions are augmented to such a degree that it seems to turn itself into resin.

2311The lamp-black of commerce is made from the soot of the pine.

2312This statement, though supported by that of Vitruvius, B. ii. c. 9, is quite erroneous. The wood of the larch gives out more heat than that of the fir, and produces more live coal in proportion.

2313This, Fée remarks, is the fact.

2314This description is inexact, and we should have some difficulty in recognizing here the larch as known to us.

2315Pliny is in error here, there being no distinction of sex in the coniferous trees. All that he relates relative to the differences between the male and female pine is consequently false. He has, however, in this instance, only perpetuated an erroneous opinion of Theophrastus.

2316This is an erroneous statement. The larch has its cone, as well as the rest. It is possible, however, that its small size may have caused it to be overlooked by Pliny.

2317Or “louse-bearing.” As Fée says, it is difficult to see the analogy.

2318The Taxus baccata of Linnæus. The account here given is in general very correct.

2319It is supposed that Pliny derives this notion as to the yew berry from Julius Cæsar, who says that “Cativulcus killed himself with the yew, a tree which grows in great abundance in Gaul and Germany.” It is, however, now known that the berry is quite innocuous; but the leaves and shoots are destructive of animal life.

2320“Viatoria;” probably not unlike our travelling flasks and pocket-pistols. This statement made by Pliny is not at all improbable.

2321This statement does not deserve a serious contradiction.

2322It is not improbable, however, thatτόξον, an “arrow,” is of older date than “taxus,” as signifying the name of the yew.

2323Numerous varieties of the coniferæ supply us with tar, and Pliny is in error in deriving it solely from the torch-tree, the Pinus mugho of Linnæus.

2324See B. xxiv. c. 23.

2325It is still obtained in a similar way.

2326Fée remarks, that Pliny is in error here; this red, watery fluid formed in the extraction of tars, being quite a different thing from “cedrium,” thealkitranorkitranof the Arabs; which is not improbably made from a cedar, or perhaps the Juniperus Phœnicea, called “Cedrus” by the two Bauhins and Tournefort. He says that it is not likely that the Egyptians would use this red substance for the purpose of preserving the dead, charged as it is with empyreumatic oil, and destitute of all properties peculiar to resins.

2327See B. xxi. c. 3, and B. xxiv. c. 23.

2328This is impracticable; neither vinegar, wine, nor water, will mingle with pitch. These resins, however, if stirred up briskly in hot water, become of a paler colour, and acquire an additional suppleness.

2329Perhaps so called from Calabria, a country where the pine abounded, and part of which was called Bruttium.

2330Or wine-vats.

2331See c.8of the present Book.

2332Stillaticia.

2333See B. xiv. c.25.

2334This operation removes from the pitch a great portion of its essential oil, and disengages it of any extraneous bodies that may have been mixed with it.

2335Fée remarks that there is no necessity for this selection, though no doubt rain-water is superior to spring or cistern water, for some purposes, from its holding no terreous salts in solution.

2336This would colour the resin more strongly, Fée says, and give it a greater degree of friability.

2337See B. xxxiv. c. 20.

2338See B. xiv. c.25, and B. xxiv. c. 22.

2339“Sartago.” Generally understood to be the same as our frying-pan. Fée remarks that this method would most inevitably cause the mass infusion to ignite; and should such not be the case, a coloured resin would be the result, coloured with a large quantity of carbon, and destitute of all the essential oil that the resin originally contained.

2340See B. xiv. c.20.

2341The terebinthine of the mastich, Fée says, is an oleo-resin, or in other words, composed of an essential oil and a resin.

2342Apparently meaning “boiled pitch.”

2343See B. xxiv. c. 26.

2344This account has been borrowed from Theophrastus, Hist. Plant. B ix. c. ii. The modern method of extracting the resin of the pine is very similar.

2345There is no foundation whatever for this statement.

2346The pith of the pine cannot be separated from the wood, and, indeed, is not easily distinguished from it. Fée says that in some of these trees masses of resin are found in the cavities which run longitudinally with the fibres, and queries whether this may not be the “marrow” or “pith” of the tree mentioned by Pliny.

2347As a torch or candle, probably.

2348This division of the larch into sexes, as previously mentioned, is only fanciful, and has no foundation in fact. The result of this operation, Fée says, would be only a sort of tar.

2349See B. xxxv. c. 51. He alludes to the bitumen known as asphalt, bitumen of Judæa, mineral pitch, mountain pitch, malthe, pissalphate.

2350These particulars, borrowed from Theophrastus, are in general correct.

2351This is not the fact; the essential oil in which the resin so greatly abounds, becomes volatile with remarkable facility.

2352Most probably one of the varieties of the pine; but the mode in which Pliny expresses himself renders it impossible to identify it with any precision.

2353B. xv. c.9.

2354The name borne also by the torch-tree.

2355See c.76of this Book.

2356He does not speak in this place of the “ornus” or “mountain ash;” nor, as Fée observes, does he mention the use of the bark of the ash as a febrifuge, or of its leaves as a purgative. This ash is the Fraxinus excelsior of Decandolles.

2357Il. xxiv. 277.

2358Pliny makes a mistake here, in copying from Theophrastus, who says that it is the yew that bears so strong a resemblance to the cedar.

2359Or “bull’s-ash.” This variety does not seem to have been identified.

2360This statement results from his misinterpretation of the language of Theophrastus, who is really speaking of the yew, which Pliny mistakes for the ash.

2361Miller asserts that, if given to cows, this leaf will impart a bad flavour to the milk; a statement which; Fée says, is quite incorrect.

2362A merely fanciful notion, without apparently the slightest foundation: the same, too, may be said of the alleged antipathy of the serpent to the beech-tree, which is neither venomous nor odoriferous.

2363This story of Pliny has been corroborated by M. de Verone, and as strongly contradicted by Camerarius and Charras: with M. Fée, then, we must leave it to the reader to judge which is the most likely to be speaking the truth. It is not improbable that Pliny may have been imposed upon, as his credulity would not at all times preclude him from being duped.

2364There is no such distinction in the linden or lime, as the flowers are hermaphroditical. They are merely two varieties: the male of Pliny being the Tilia microphylla of Decandolles, and a variety of the Tilia Europæa of Linnæus; and the female being the Tilia platyphyllos, another variety of the Tilia Europæa of Linnæus.

2365Not at all singular, Fée says, the fruit being dry and insipid.

2366In France these cords are still made, and are used for well-ropes, wheat-sheafs, &c. In the north of France, too, brooms are made of the outer bark, and the same is the case in Westphalia.

2367See B. xxi. c. 4. Ovid, Fasti, B. v. l. 337, speaks of the revellers at drunken banquets binding their hair with the philyra.

2368“Teredo.” If he means under this name to include the tinea as well, the assertion is far too general, as this wood is eaten away by insects, though more slowly than the majority of the non-resinous woods. It is sometimes perforated quite through by the larvæ of the byrrhus, our death-watch.

2369This is incorrect. It attains a very considerable height, and sometimes an enormous size. The trunk is known to grow to as much as forty or fifty feet in circumference.

2370The maple is much less in size than what the lime or linden really is.

2371See B. xiii. c.29.

2372Fée says there are but five varieties of the maple known in France. He doubts whether the common maple, the Acer campestre of Linnæus, was known to the ancients.

2373Fée identifies it with the Acer pseudo-platanus of Linnæus, the Acer montanum candidum of C. Bauhin. This tree is not uncommon in Italy.

2374“Acer pavonaceum:” “peacock maple.” He gives a similar account of the spots on the wood of the citrus, B. xiii. c.19.

2375Or “thick-veined” maple.

2376Supposed by Fée to be the Acer Monspessulanus of Linnæus, also the Acer trilobum of Linnæus.

2377A variety of the Acer pseudo-platanus of Linnæus, according to Fée.

2378The Carpinus betulus of Linnæus; the horn-beam or yoke-elm.

2379“Silicios.” This word appears to be explained by the accompanying word “laminas;” but it is very doubtful what is the correct reading.

2380The Alnus glutinosa of Decandolles. In c.38, Pliny says, very incorrectly, that the alder has a remarkably thick leaf; and in c.45, with equal incorrectness, that it bears neither seed nor fruit.

2381Fée observes, that it is incorrect to say that the male tree blossoms before the female, if such is Pliny’s meaning here.

2382From the Greek, meaning “a tree with clusters.” It is the Staphylea pinnata of Linnæus, the wild or false pistachio of the French.

2383“Siliqua.” This term, Fée says, is very inappropriate to the fruit of this tree, which is contained in a membranous capsule. The kernel is oily, and has the taste of the almond more than the nut.

2384The Buxus sempervirens of Linnæus.

2385It is still extensively used for a similar purpose.

2386There are only two species now known: that previously mentioned, and the Buxus Balearica of Lamarck. The first is divided into the four varieties, arborescens, angustifolia, suffruticosa, and myrtifolia.

2387The Buxus sempervirens of Linnæus; very common in the south of France, and on the banks of the Loire.

2388It is doubtful if this is a box at all. The wild olive, mentioned in B. xv. c.7, has the same name; all the varieties of the box emit a disagreeable smell.

2389A variety of the Buxus sempervirens, the same as the Buxus suffruticosa of Lamarck.

2390The Pyrenean box is mostly of the arborescent kind.

2391In Phrygia. See B. v. c. 29.

2392The arborescent variety.

2393This is doubted by Fée, but it is by no means impossible. In Pennsylvania the bees collect a poisonous honey from the Kalmia latifolia.

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