The Orange. 177 



eastern Asia by the Portuguese. The latter conjecture is 

 supported by the fact of the orange being called in Nice 

 and Italy Portogalie and Portogalli. When first conveyed 

 to England is also unknown. The earliest mention of 

 it, as regards this country, appears to be in Queen 

 Eleanor's household expense book for A.D. 1290, where 

 it is said that she purchased from a Spanish ship which 

 came to Portsmouth, "vii. poma de orenge." By the 

 time of Elizabeth it had become common, since Gerard 

 says that "every circumstance belonging to the forme 

 is very well known to all." So in Coriolanus, ii. i, for 

 although the scene is laid in Rome, the allusion in the 

 case of the litigant " orange wife " is to London ways. 

 It was in the Shaksperean age that the fashion of carry- 

 ing "pomanders" was introduced. These were oranges 

 from which the whole of the pulp had been scooped out, 

 a circular hole being made at the top, then after the 

 peel had been thoroughly dried filled with spices, so as 

 to constitute a sort of scent-box. The pomander was 

 suspended from the neck, or carried in the hand, accord- 

 ing to the fancy of the owner. It is this, and not a 

 veritable orange, which may often be seen in old portraits, 

 though the painters seem not always to have understood 

 what they were doing. It was in the Shaksperean age, 

 also, that the orange-/r^ was first grown in England, the 

 earliest having been cultivated by Sir Francis Carew, 

 half-nephew, by marriage, of the unfortunate Sir Walter 

 Raleigh, in his garden at Beddington, Surrey. Sir Francis 

 brought his young plants from Portugal, in or about 1595. 



2A 



