24 HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF TREES. PART I. 



the custom in France. The antiquity of the sweet chestnut at 

 Tortworth, which he had ascertained iVom Lord Ducie to be 

 much exaggerated, he alleges to be no proof that the tree is 

 indigenous. " The English, or narrow-leaved, elm," he says, 

 "being much esteemed hy the Romans, was jjrobably introduced 

 by them. The box," he erroneously (see Herb., 1597, P- 122G.) 

 states, " is not mentioned by Gerard, and," he adds, " the tree 

 is found nowhere in an apparently wild state, except on Box 

 Hill, where it was planted by Lord Arundel, who designed to 

 build a house there, but who rehnquished his intention from 

 the want of water, and built one at Albury hard by." The 

 only native evergreen trees and shrubs of Britain would thus 

 a{)pear to be the Scotch pine, the holly, the juniper, the furze, 

 the spurge laurel, the butcher's broom, and the ivy. The furze 

 Dr. Walker supposes not to be aboriginal, but to have been 

 introduced from the mountains of Portugal, where it abounds. 

 His reason is, that it is the only alleged indigenous shrub which 

 flowers during winter ; and that during severe winters it is 

 killed to the ground, both in England and Scotland. According 

 to these authors, the only indigenous evergreen trees are the 

 Scotch pine and the holly ; so that we are thus reduced to two 

 evergreen trees and four evergreen shrubs ; unless we include 

 such under-shrubs as the heath, the Androraedff, the ^rctosta- 

 phylos U\a ursi, &c., which do not generally attain the height 

 of two feet. 



Perhaps it may be thought vmreasonable to allege that the 

 lime and tlie yew are not natives of Britain, since they unques- 

 tionably are of countries which lie farther north; viz., the north 

 of Germany and Sweden : but it must be remembered that the 

 summers of those countries are hotter than those of England, in 

 conse(p;ence of which, the lime ripens its seeds every year, which 

 it seldom does in Britain. In countries without extremes either 

 of heat or cold, such as the sea coast of Britain and great part of 

 Leland, many trees will live and thrive without ever producing 

 seeds. Such trees may remain for ages in a country, without 

 being one step nearer naturalisation than the day on which they 

 Avere introduced. In Hasted's Kent it is stated that Sir John 

 Speilman, who introduced the manufacture of paper into England 

 from Germany, in the time of Elizabeth, and to whom Queen 

 Elizabeth granted the manor of Portbridge in Dartford, intro- 

 duced the lime tree. He is said to have brought over two trees 

 with him in his portmanteau, and to have planted them at Port- 

 bridge, near the dwelling-house belonging to the powder mills ; 

 where, according to Hasted, they remained till they were cut 

 down a few years previously to the time when he wrote, which 

 was in 1776- {Beauties of Enyland, b^c, Kent, p. 56'.'.) The 

 lime, however, is represented by Turner as growing to a large 

 size in 15G2; so that the trees introduced by Speilman could 



