223 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



[July, 



that I onco sont you a paper showint^ pin inly 

 their practicability, and you refused to puhlisli 

 it. Also, you refused to publish my rejily to 

 Jacob Staufl'er, the solicitor of jjatents, who op- 

 posed the ]>roposed protection in the Monthhj. 

 Therefore, I am led to doubt that you desire 

 to show lair jilay to both parties. If, by the 

 word j)racticability, you mean the framini; of a 

 law wliich no one cm break, of course the case 

 is pranted, as there never was a law made yet, 

 which was not trans;Aressed by some one. But 

 the majority of people abide by the laws, and 

 tlicrc is just as much reason to suppose that tin; 

 majority of pcojile would rej;ard the proposed 

 enactment as any other protection. 



"Jacob Mooue." 



[Mr. Jacob Moore writes occasionally as if we 

 had some special ill-will against him, but he is 

 much mistaken. Some time since he wrote that 

 he had " now done with us and our likes for 

 ever," and we were therefore surprised at receiv- 

 ing this letter from him. As, however, it is a 

 sign of returning good sense, and not very long, 

 we let Mr. Moore be heard, merely taking out a 

 paragraph referring to another magazine, with 

 which we have nothing to do. In future, how- 

 ever, we shall prefer if Mr. Moore will choose 

 other channels as vent holes for his righteous 

 indignation. The Gardener's Monthhj has no 

 taste for that class of literature, "righteous" or 

 otherwise.— Ed. G. M.] 



OuiGiN OF THE Name " Waln'jt." — Walnut, a 

 name that occurs with little variation in the 

 German and Swedish dialects, is from the "An- 

 glo-Saxon " wealh-knut'" the foreign nut; 

 "wealh " was a term our rude forefathers ap- 

 plied to anything foreign, hence "wealh-men," 

 (Welshmen) the Celtic race formerly inhabiting 

 this country, but driven by them into the fast- 

 nesses of the Welsh mountains. The etymology 

 of this word implies that the same people were 

 acquainted with this fruit long before the tree 

 was introduced. Like many other fruit-bearing 

 trees, it is supposed to have been introduced by 

 the Romans, but to have been lost through the 

 neglect they received after the departure of these 

 warlike people, and to have been re-introduccd 

 by the monks of the middle ages, who were 

 great gardeners and cultivators. — Gardener's 

 Chronicle. 



The Age of Orange TuEra.— The Paris jour- 

 nals announce the death of a famous orange 

 tree in its 455th year, known under the name o! 

 Grand Bourbon or Grand Connfetable. In the 

 year 1421 the Queen of Navarre gave her gar- 



dener the seed at Pampcluna. Tltence sprang 

 the j)1ant, which was subseciuently transported 

 to Chantilly. In 15(}2, however, the Constable 

 of Bourbon (I.,ord of Chantilly) having sided 

 witli Charles V. against Francis I., his goods 

 were confiscated, and along with them the or- 

 ange tree, which was duly sent to Fontainebleau, 

 whence, in 1GS4, Lottis XIV. transferred it to 

 Versailles, where it remained the largest, finest, 

 and most fertile member of the orangery, it« 

 head being fifteen metres round, and the trunk 

 seven metres high. — Journal of Horticulture. 



Repton's Tomb. — Humphrey Repton, the 

 writer on landscape gardening, was buried at 

 Aylsham, in Norfolk, and the following is hia 

 epitaph, inserted in the wall of the church close 

 to the chancel door: — 



"Not, like t'gypliaii tyrants, consecrate, 

 Unmixed witli oilicrs, shall my dust remain; 

 Kut blending, mould'rinR, sinking into earth, 

 Mine shall give form aud colour to the Rose; 

 And while its vivid blossoms cheer mankind, 

 Its fragrant odurs shall ascend to heaven !" 



A small railed-in garden is in front of the tab- 

 let, and this garden is always kept bright and 

 orderly by cousins of Mr. Repton, who live in 

 Aylsham. — Journal of Horticulture. 



ExGLisn National Emblematic Plants. — 

 Some notes on these were in this Journal a few 

 weeks since, and I hoped to see others, but as 

 they have not appeared, I copy the following 

 from a MS. volume. Many centuries before the 

 wars which 



" Sent between the red Rose and the white, 

 A thousand souls to death and deadly night,'' 



the flower had been famous in our island, and 

 its emblem was and is the Rosa anglia alba, the 

 white English Rose. Some writers have thought 

 that the name Albion was applied to our island 

 on account of the white roses it produced. 



The Thistle is the emblem plant of Scotland, 

 and if the tradition was founded on fact it is the 

 Stemless Thistle, Cnicus acaulis. According to 

 that tradition the Norsemen would have sur- 

 prised the Scotch clans in a night attack if one of 

 their spies had not uttered a loud imprecation 

 upon trending barefooted upon one of these This- 

 tles. The clans dubbed the i)lant "The Scotch 

 Thistle," and it was accepted as a representative 

 plant, and the appropriate complimentary motto 

 attached, Nemo me impiine lacesset — No one in- 

 jures me with impunit}'. 



It is doubtful what plant was first adopted for 



