LIME TEIBE 141 



The ancestors of our great Swedish botanist owed their name to a Linden- 

 tree growing near their dwelling, Liniie being the Swedish name of Linniieus ; 

 and Hohenlinden is one of many places called after this tree. Several 

 Linden-trees are famous in local histories and in poetry, like that under 

 which Martin Luther stood and preached the doctrines of the Keformation ; 

 or that huge tree, at Fribourg, which commemorates the victory of the 

 Swiss over Charles the Bold, in 1476. This tree is old, but a Lime-tree older 

 yet, and supposed to have been planted a thousand years ago, stands at no 

 great distance from it, and has a trunk thirty-six feet in circumference. 

 One of the finest Limes in England is that celebrated one of Moor Park, in 

 Hertfordshire, which is surrounded by many a large and old companion, and 

 is itself nearly a hundred feet high. What Bryant said of another group of 

 trees is true of these Limes : — 



" These shades are still the abodes 

 Of undissenibled gladness : the tliick roof 

 Of green and stirring branches is alive 

 And musical with birds,, that sing and sport 

 In wantonness of spirit ; while below, 

 The squirrel, with raised paws and form erect, 

 Chirps merrily. Throngs of insects in the glade 

 Try their thin wings, and dance in the warm beam 

 That waked them into life. Even the gi'een trees 

 Partake the deep contentment as they bend 

 To the soft winds ; the sun from the blue sky 

 Looks in, and sheds a blessing on the scene ; 

 Scarce less the cleft-born wild-flower seems to enjoy 

 Existence than the winged plunderer 

 That seeks its sweets." 



Professor Burnett tells us that there are some famous old Lime-trees, a 

 variety of Tilia platyphyllos, growing in the churchyard of Seidlitz, in 

 Bohemia, the broad leaves of which are hooded ; and the peasants assure 

 you that they have miraculously borne hooded leaves ever since the monks 

 of a neighbouring convent were hanged upon them. 



The Rev. C. A. Johns, in his work on the Forest Trees of Britain, mentions 

 several remarkable Lime-trees as having been described by various authors. 

 "At Chalouse, in Switzerland," says this writer, "there stood one in Evelyn's 

 time, under which was a bower composed of its branches, capable of contain- 

 ing 300 persons sitting at ease ; it had a fountain, set about with many 

 tables formed only of the boughs, to which they ascend by steps, all kept so 

 accurately and so very thick, that the sun never looked into it." The same 

 author mentions another famous Lime at Neustadt, in AVirtemberg, which 

 gave a distinctive name to the town. Its huge limbs were supported by 

 numerous stone columns, bearing inscriptions. This tree was still in 

 existence, Loudon tells us in his "Arboretum," in 1838, the trunk being 

 eighteen feet in diameter, and beneath its broad shadow the people of 

 Neustadt were then, like the men of former generations, accustomed to sit 

 and eat fruit ; many gooseberry -bushes having sprung up in the crevices and 

 hollows of the bai-k, and furnishing a supply to those who came to sit beneath 

 the shelter of the old tree. 



German poets, like our own, often refer to the Linden-tree. Even so 

 long ago as the days of Chaucer, it was to be found on the poet's pages. 



