The Walnut 267 



Juglans mandshurica. Manchu xdsixa designates the tree, while its 

 fruit is called xdwalama or xdwalame usixa {-ixa being a frequent ter- 

 mination in the names of plants and fruits). The cultivated walnut is 

 styled mase. 1 One of the earliest explorers of the Amur territory, the 

 Cossack chieftain Poyarkov, who reached the Amur in 1644, reported 

 that walnuts and hazel-nuts were cultivated by the Daur or Dahur on 

 the Dseya and Amur. 1 



The same species is known to the aboriginal tribes of Yun-nan. 

 The Pa-yi and San style its fruit twai; 3 the Nyi Lo-lo, se-mi-ma; the Ahi 

 Lo-lo, sa-mi. The Cun-kia of Kwei-cou call it dsao; the Ya-c'io Miao, 

 U or H] the Hwa Miao, klaeo; while other Miao tribes have the Chinese 

 loan-word he-dao.* 



The wild walnut has not remained unknown to the Chinese, and it 

 is curious that it is designated San hu t'ao tfj #§ $iS, the term San ("moun- 

 tain") referring to wild-growing plants. The "wild Iranian peach" 

 is a sort of linguistic anomaly. It is demonstrated by this term that 

 the wild indigenous species was discovered and named by the Chinese 

 only in times posterior to the introduction of the cultivated variety; and 

 that the latter, being introduced from abroad, was not derived from the 

 wild-growing species. The case is identical with that of the wild alfalfas 

 and vines. C'en Hao-tse, who wrote a treatise on flowers in 1688, 8 

 determines the difference between the cultivated and wild varieties 

 thus: the former has a thin shell, abundant meat, and is easy to break; 6 

 the latter has a thick and hard shell, which must be cracked with a 

 hammer, and occurs in Yen and Ts'i (Ci-li and San-tun). This observa- 



1 K'ien-luh's Polyglot Dictionary, Ch. 28, p. 55. 



* L. v. Schrenck, Reisen und Forschungen im Amur-Lande, Vol. Ill, p. 160. 

 3 F. W. K. MttLLER, Toung Pao, Vol. Ill, 1892, p. 26. 



* S. R. Clarke, Tribes in South- West China, p. 312. 

 6 Hwa kin, Ch. 3, p. 49 b. 



* According to the Ci wu min Si t'u k'ao (Ch. 31, p. 3 b), the walnuts with thin 

 shells grow only in the prefecture of Yun-p'in fo ^P in Ci-li, being styled lu tan 

 ho t'ao J& U $% $j} In C'an-li, which belongs to this prefecture, these nuts have 

 been observed by F. N. Meyer (Agricultural Explorations in the Orchards of China, 

 p. 51), who states, "Some trees produce small hard-shelled nuts of poor flavor, while 

 others bear fine large nuts, with a really fine flavor, and having shells so thin that 

 they can be cracked with the fingers like peanuts. Between these extremes one finds 

 many gradations in hardness of shell, size, and flavor." "In England the walnut 

 presents considerable differences, in the shape of the fruit, in the thickness of the 

 husk, and in the thinness of the shell; this latter quality has given rise to a variety 

 called the thin-shelled, which is valuable, but suffers from the attacks of titmice" 

 (Darwin, Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication, Vol. I, p. 445). 

 A variety of walnut with thin shells grows on the Greek Island Paros (T. v. Held- 

 eeich, Nutzpflanzen Griechenlands, p. 59). 



