EUPIIORBIACE.E. 97 



The georactrical style of garcToning, in which the box-trees played so prominent a 

 part, was bronglit to great perfection in the time of Louis XIV. The dwarf A'ariety of 

 box was used to trace out the pattern of a parterre, the space between the lines being 

 filled in with different coloured sands, earths, shells, and otber articles, so as to produce 

 red, Avhite, and black grounds, on which the green box appeared to advantage. Lord 

 Bacon says : " As for making of knots and figures with divers coloured earths, they 

 be but toys ; you may see as good sights many times in tarts." We incline to think 

 he would repeat his remark if he were introduced to a portion of the Hoi-ticultural 

 Gardens at Kensington at the present day. The art of cutting the box and other trees 

 into artificial fonns was carried to such an extent among the Romans that lioth Pliny 

 and Vitruvius use the word topiar'ius to express the art of the gardener — a proof that 

 the art of clipping was considered the highest accomplishment for a Roman gardener. 

 Topiary adornments, as they are called, were most highly prized in gardens about 

 the middle of the seventeentb century, and began to go out of favour in the early 

 part of the eighteenth, when they afforded subjects for raillery among the wits of 

 the day : — 



" There likewise mote be seen on eveiy side 



The shapely box of all its branching pride, 



Ungently shorae, and with preposterous skill, 



To various beasts, and birds of sundry quill 



Transform'd, and human shapes of monsti'ous size." 



In former times the uses of the box were various, but are now almost forgotten. 

 The bark and leaves are purgative and sudorific. A tincture made from the leaves is 

 used in Germany as a remedy in intermittent fever, having obtained its rejDutation 

 from its employment by a quack, who sold the secret to Joseph. I. The wood scraped 

 to a powder has been used as a substitute for guiacum, and an oil distilled from it is 

 said to be good for toothache. According to Parkinson, a " decoction of the leaves 

 and sawdust will change the hair to an auburn colour." We have not heard, how- 

 ever, of its use during the fashionable rage for auburn hair, although, we fear, far 

 more objectionable applications are frequently employed to obtain the correct shade of 

 aiiburn tresses by those who sacrifice nature to fashion. Box is sometimes substituted 

 for holly in th.e churches at Christmas, and in a note to Wordsworth's poems we aro 

 informed that " in several parts of the north of England, when a funeral takes place, 

 a basinful of sprigs of box is placed at the door of the house from which the coffin is 

 taken up, and each person who attends the funeral takes one of these sprigs, and 

 throws it into the grave of the deceased person." 



The box is the badge of the Highland clan M'Intosh, and the variegated kind of the 

 clan M'Pherson. It is asserted by many authoi'S that box-trees ai-e never cropped by 

 cattle, and that the Corsican honey was rendei'ed poisonous from the bees feeding on 

 the flowers of the box. In our own experience we can testify to the death of several 

 fowls, only to be explained by the fact of their having eaten largely of box-leaves. 

 The largest box-trees in the neighbourhood of London are at Syon and Kew, each 

 nearly 15 feet in height. In the Botanic Garden at Oxford there are two old trees, 

 one of which, in 1835, was 21 feet high. The lai'gest box -hedge is at Petworth. It 

 is supposed to be more than two centuries old, and is more than 12 feet broad at the 

 bottom, 15 feet high, and 40 yards long. The only county in England in which the 

 box appears to be naturalised is Surrey. It is so abundant in the neighbourhood of 

 Dorking, as to have given the name Boxhill to a well-known pleasant locality about 

 tv/enty miles from London. 



VOL. viri. o 



