SPURGE TRIBE 125 



and the Box." As the Box is peculiarly a tree of mountainous regions, and 

 well fitted to the calcareous soils of Mount Lebanon, and as its wood is hard 

 and firm, it seems likely that it would be brought with the firs and pines for 

 the service of the builder, while, by its beauty and its hardy nature, when 

 contrasting with the dark firs, it would be well adapted for removing the 

 dreary aspect of the desert. The ashur-wood, too, is believed to be the Box. 

 The Prophet Ezekiel, when referring to the magnificence of Tyre, describes 

 the benches of the rowers as made of ashur-wood, inlaid with ivory ; and 

 Virgil and other ancient writers allude to the practice of inlaying Box-wood 

 with this material. 



The Box-tree was, both in this country and in Rome, used for cutting 

 into various forms. Pliny the j^^ounger relates how he had at his country 

 seat Box-trees cut into the forms of men on horseback, a hunter with his 

 hounds, quadrupeds, vases, and other objects ; and mentions that one Box- 

 tree was so large as to be cut into diflferent apartments. Martial mentions 

 clipped Box-trees as ornamenting the gardens at the house of Bassus. From 

 our own old writers we learn that the topiary art came into practice in this 

 country at the commencement of the sixteenth century ; and Lawson, who 

 wrote at the close of it, remarks, that the lesser wood might be framed b}'^ a 

 gardener to the shape of men armed in the field, " ready to give battel, or 

 swift running greyhounds, or of well-scented and true-running houndes to 

 chase the deere, or hunt the hare." " This kind of hunting," he quaintly 

 adds, " shall not waste your corne, nor much your coyne." The taste for 

 these verdant sculptures was at its height in the seventeenth century, but 

 after that time most lovers of gardens came to agree with the sentiment of 

 Lord Bacon, who says, " I, for my part, do not like images cut out of juniper 

 or other garden stuffe, they be for children." 



The wood of the Box is very valuable, and very durable ; and, as Virgil 

 said — 



"Smooth grain'd, and proper for the turner's trade, 

 Which curious hands may carve, and steel with ease invade." 



The ancients prized it very highly for musical instruments, and the word 

 Buxus, the name of the tree, also denoted a flute. The town of St. Claude, 

 in France, is almost entirely inhabited by turners, who make from the wood 

 obtained from the trees of the large Box-wood in their neighbourhood, 

 rosaries, beads, salad forks and spoons, snuff-boxes, and other articles, which, 

 by various modes of preparation, are made to resemble the beautiful turnery 

 called Tunbridge ware. It was formerly much used, both in France and 

 England, for inlaying in other wood. 



Arthur Young mentions that in some parts of France the Box was cut 

 down from the mountains, and laid as manure around the roots of the mul- 

 berry-trees with very good success. The leaves of the tree are deleterious 

 to animals, and are generally refused by them, though camels sometimes eat 

 them, and die in consequence. They possess sudorific pi'operties, and made 

 into a tincture, they formed a once much celebrated medicine for intermittent 

 fevers. A German empiric, who made this medicine, long kept its ingredients 

 a profound secret, but Joseph II. purchased the recipe at the expense of 

 fifteen hundred florins. No sooner, however, was it ascertained that the 



