HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



137 



of Provence. At present not more than ten species 

 are recognised. Chinese authors state that the tree 

 came to their country from Thibet from 140 to 

 150 B.C. 



That the Hebrews were amongst its earliest culti- 

 vators there can be but little doubt, since their King 

 Solomon, who "spake of trees from the cedar tree 

 that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that springeth out 

 of the wall," writes (Song of Solomon, Cap. VI., 

 v. 11): " I went down into the garden of nuts, to 

 see the fruits of the valley," referring, commentators 

 tell us, to the "walnut." 



From Persia it certainly was brought to Greece, 

 and the Greeks, who were wont to say that "in the 

 golden age men lived upon nuts and the gods upon 

 walnuts," knew it by the names of persicon, basilion, 

 and caryon, this last name being said to be derived 

 from the supposed fact that its emanations were very 

 oppressive to the head. 



Its introduction amongst the Romans is variously 

 given ; by some it is dated as far back as the period 

 of regal supremacy in Rome, whilst others state that 

 it was cultivated by them "before the death of the 

 Emperor Tiberias ;" at any rate, they regarded it as 

 of Persian origin. They made use of it in their festi- 

 vals, especially at marriage ceremonies, regarding it 

 as an emblem of the union of two, from its form, or, 

 as some suppose, on account of its two shells or 

 coverings. Minute accounts of the customs observed 

 at their marriages tell us that, whilst songs were 

 sung at the door of the marriage chamber, the bride- 

 groom stood without and scattered walnuts amongst 

 the young folks assembled, who scrambled for the 

 fruit amidst laughter and merriment. 



From Pliny we get some secrets regarding the 

 toilet of Roman ladies. He says: " They used the 

 green shells to dye their wool, but the small nuts 

 just developing were in great demand for giving a 

 red hue to the hair, a tint vastly admired and greatly 

 in fashion with the maidens of the day." As to the 

 matrons, he tells us " they needed it to dye the hair 

 when it has become grey ! " The shells burnt and 

 beaten up with oil or wine were used to anoint the 

 heads of infants, having a tendency, it was supposed, 

 to make the hair grow. 



Other virtues, too, seem to have been imputed to 

 it : the leaves beaten up with vinegar were accounted 

 a sure cure for earache. Mithridates, King of 

 Pontus, left a recipe in his own handwriting, which, 

 Galen tells us, Marcus Aurelius was wont to use 

 regularly every day. It is as follows: "Take two 

 dried walnuts, two figs, and twenty leaves of rue ; 

 pound these together with the addition of a grain of 

 salt. If a person take this mixture fasting, he will 

 be proof against all poisons for that day." Walnut 

 kernels, chewed by a man fasting, and applied to the 

 wound, were said to effect an instantaneous cure of 

 bites inflicted by a mad dog ! Much easier this than 

 M. Pasteur's beneficent process ! 



If all these good effects were believed to flow from 

 the nut, the tree itself was accredited with fully a 

 corresponding amount of mischief. Its shadow was 

 said to be baneful and injurious to man, "in whom 

 it is productive of headache, the emanations from 

 the tree itself penetrating to the very brain ;" and it 

 was looked upon as equally noxious to anything 

 growing in its vicinity. It is a well-known fact in 

 the present day that flies are kept away by its pre- 

 sence. Costermongers and others who use donkeys 

 in their daily avocations, frequently in hot weather 

 rub their legs with the juice of walnut leaves, and 

 find it effectual in protecting the poor beasts from 

 the tormenting attacks of flies. A walnut tree 

 planted near the house keeps flies from the rooms 

 whose windows open near to it. 



There is no history of the introduction of this tree 

 into Great Britain ; some conjecture that it came 

 hither from France, since up to the middle of the 

 sixteenth century they were called "Gaul nuts." 

 The tree does not easily naturalise itself, nor does it 

 spread easily by seeds, ,as they do not germinate 

 unless in a tolerably warm climate, nor does the 

 tree thrive where subjected to very severe frost. 



It appears to have been in general use in Queen 

 Elizabeth's time, since Sir Walter Raleigh, intro- 

 ducing the practice of tobacco smoking, or, as it was 

 then called, tobacco drinking or sucking, set the 

 example of imbibing the fumes by means of a walnut 

 shell and a straw ! 



Queen Anne of Denmark, Consort of James I., 

 had in her room a "walnut tree chest of drawers ;" 

 and in a list of furniture provided for the Princess 

 Elizabeth, daughter of the same monarch, we find 

 included "a folding-table of walnut tree." 



Thomas Tusser, in his " Five Hundred Points of 

 Good Husbandry" (1570), repeatedly mentions the 

 walnut tree. In September's "'Husbandry" he 

 says : 



" Out ; fruit go and gather, but not in the dew, 

 With crab and the walnut, for fear of a shrew." 



and in January's : 



" Set chestnut and walnut, 

 Set filbert and small nut," &c. 



Evelyn, writing a century later, gives a voluminous 

 account of the walnut tree. An extract from his 

 "Sylva"may be of interest. He says: " Walnut- 

 juglans, quasi jovis glans, the wall or Welch nut, is 

 of several sorts .... Burgundy abounds with 

 them, where they stand in the midst of goodly wheat 

 lands, at sixty and one hundred feet distance, and, so 

 far are they from hurting the crop, that they are 

 looked upon as great preservers by keeping the 

 ground warm ; nor do the roots hinder the plow. 

 Whenever they fell a tree, which is only when old 

 and decayed, they always place a young one near 

 him ; and in several places betwixt Hanau and 

 Frankfort, in Germany, no young farmer whatsoever 



