SHOHT NOTES 299 



SHORT NOTES. 



Hatbeech A.ND Hornbeam. The late Dr. John Nisbet Avrites 

 {British Forest Trees, p. 272 (1893)) : — " The Hornbeam is described 

 as being indigenous from the south-west of France eastwards across 

 central and eastern Europe to Persia, northwards to England and 

 Ireland (but not Scotland) and the southern portion of Sweden, and 

 southwards to lower Italy and Oreece. The evidence of historical 

 records goes, however, to prove that it was not originally among the 

 forest trees of England, but was introduced from the Continent before 

 the close of the fifteenth century." Few British botanists will, I 

 think, doubt the indigenous character of the tree. Even Mr. Dunn, 

 who is generally prone to class plants as aliens, says {Alien Flora 

 of Britain, p. 173) : — " A native of the south-eastern counties of 

 England, and perhajss in a few places fm'ther north and west, but far 

 more common in England, Scotland, and Wales as a planted tree " ; 

 while Messrs. Elwes and Henrj^ seem to accept — as did Hooker in the 

 Student's Flora — the evidence accumulated by Hewett Watson, and 

 to consider it as truly wild from Kent and Dorset to Stafford and 

 Norfolk — a distribution quite in keeping with that on the Continent. 

 As Trimen and Dyer say {Flora of Middlesex, p. 265), Hornbeam 

 " formed a large, perhaps the chief part of the ancient forest on the 

 clay north of London, of which Enfield Chase was the remains ; it is 

 still the chief tree in many pai-ts of Epping Forest"; and 1 have seen 

 the tree growing with every appearance of wildness over most of the 

 area just stated. It is true that we have no earlier mention of it in 

 English botanical literature than Gerard's Serhall (1597), p. 1296, 

 where he says " the Hornbeame tree grows plentifully in North- 

 amptonshire, also in Kent by Gravesend, where it is commonly taken 

 for a kind of Elme " ; and I know of no early reference to it in 

 general English literature, though, perhaps, the well-known fact that the 

 tree is in all countries confused by the unscientific with others, beech, 

 elm or hazel, is a sufficient explanation of the absence of such allusions. 

 I have, however, just come across a piece of folk-lore which affords, 

 I think, some valuable evidence. In S. Graveson's The Chalfont 

 Country (Homeland Association, 1904), the Rev. W. H. Summers in 

 an Introduction (p. 13) writes : — " On the eastern side [of the 

 Chilterns] the Hornbeam, locally called ' hay beech ' is plentiful, as in 

 the adjoining county of Hertford." That this name was still well- 

 known as a})plicable to the Hornbeam I confirmed by enquiry from 

 the first hedger and ditcher I met in the neighbourhood of the 

 Chalfonts ; l)ut was sur])rised to find that the only reference to it in 

 Britten and Holland's dictionary of Enylish Plant Names (p. 246) 

 was "A variety of Fay its sylvatica L. — ' Thei'e are some trees in our 

 woods with a rougher bark, which the woodmen call Hay Beech.' 

 Mart. Mill.'''' I l)elieve this " rough-barked beech " to be merely the 

 hearsay repetition of some unscientific j^erson's observation of the 

 Hornbeam ; but the present interest is the name. It is, of course, 

 not unlike the German hainhiiche, the thicket beech; but hay — in 

 combination in English words seems always to be the old English 

 haga, hedge, as in Haymaiden and Iled^emaiden, both names for 



