124 pFant Isore, Tsege^/, anil T^qriq/". 



This vegetable salamander finds its equal in a plant described 

 by Nieuhoff as growing in rocky and stony places in the kingdom 

 of Tanju, in Tartary. This extraordinary plant cannot be either 

 ignited or consumed by fire ; for although it becomes hot, and on 

 account of the heat becomes glowing red in the fire, yet so soon 

 as heat is removed, it grows cold, and regains its former appear- 

 ance: in water, however, this plant is wont to become quite putrid. 



Of a nature somewhat akin to these fire-loving plants must be 

 the Japanese Palm, described by A. Montanus. This tree is said 

 to shun moisture to such an extent, that if its trunk be in the least 

 wet, it at once pines away and perishes as though it had been 

 poisoned. However, if this arid tree be taken up by the roots, 

 throughly dried in the sun, and re-planted with sand and iron 

 filings around it, it will once more flourish, and become covered 

 with new branches and leaves, provided that so soon as it has 

 been re-planted, the old leaves are cut off with an iron instrument 

 and fastened to the trunk. 



The Bishop remarks that " one of the most wonderful plants 

 is that which so mollifies the bones, that when we have eaten of 

 it we cannot stand upon our legs. An ox who has tasted of it 

 cannot go ; his bones grow so pliant, that you may bend his legs 

 like a twig of Ozier. The remedy is to make him swallow some 

 of the bones of an animal who died from eating of that herb : 'tis 

 certain death, and cannot be otherwise, for the teeth grow soft 

 immediately, and 'tis impossible even to eat again." " There is a 

 plant that produces a totally opposite effedl:. It hardens the bones 

 to a wondrous degree, A man who has chewed some of it, will 

 have his teeth so hard as to be able to reduce flints and pebbles 

 into impalpable powder." 



Maundevile describes some wonderful Balm-trees that in his 

 time grew near Cairo, in a field wherein were seven wells " that 

 cure Lord Jesu Christ made with on of His feet, whan He wente 

 to pleyen with other children." The balm obtained from these 

 trees was considered so precious, that no one but the appointed 

 tenders was allowed to approach them. Christians alone were 

 permitted to till the ground in which they grew, as if Saracens 

 were employed, the trees would not yield ; and moreover it was 

 necessary that men should " kutten the braunches with a scharp 

 flyntston or with a scharp bon, whanne men wil go to kutte hem: 

 For who so kutte hem with iren, it wolde destroye his vertue and 

 his nature." 



The old knight has left a record of his impressions of the 

 country near the shores of the Dead Sea, and has given a sketch of 

 those Apple-trees of which Byron wrote — 



" Like to the Apples on the Dead Sea's shore, 

 All ashes to the taste.'' 



These trees producing Dead Sea fruit he tells us bore "fulle faire 

 Apples, and faire of colour to behold ; but whoso brekethe hem or 



