WALNUT. 141 



is made from the kernel. In Spain, they strew the gratings 

 of old and hard nuts, first peeled, into their tarts and other 

 meats. The leaves strewed on the ground, and left there, 

 annoy moles, or macerated in warm water, afford a liquor 

 which will destroy them. The unripe fruit is used in medi- 

 cine for the purpose of destroying worms in the human 

 body. Pliny says, "the more Walnuts one eats, with the 

 more ease will he drive worms out of the stomach." 



The timber is considered lighter, in proportion to its 

 strength and elasticity, than any other, and therefore com- 

 monly used in England for gun stocks. It is used in cabi- 

 net work in most parts of Europe ; the young timber is 

 allowed to make the finest coloured work, but the old to be 

 finest variegated for ornament. When propagated for tim- 

 ber, the nut is sown ; but when fruit is the object, inarching 

 from the branches of fruit- bearing trees is preferable. Bud- 

 ding is also practised by some ; the buds succeed best when 

 taken from the base of the annual shoots ; ordinary sized 

 buds from the upper part of such shoots generally fail. 



Walnut trees that have not been grafted or budded, may 

 be induced to produce blossoms by ringing the bark, that is, 

 cutting out a streak of the bark around the body or main 

 branches of the tree. Walnut trees seldom yield much 

 fruit until fifteen or twenty years old ; it is produced on the 

 extremities of the preceding year's shoots. The trees should 

 stand forty or fifty feet apart, and they may be permitted to 

 branch out in their natural order. They need but little 

 pruning, merely to regulate any casual disorderly growth, 

 to reduce over-extended branches, and to prune up the low 

 stragglers. 



Lest any of our native Walnuts should be neglected or 

 abandoned by any, I annex a description of the different 

 kinds : 



Julians calharticus, is known under the name of Butter- 

 nut. Oilnut, and white Walnut ; these nuts are used by the 

 Indians as a medicine. 



