AES 



JETN 



ttH Are flowers which appear in May, 



\\ith the intermixture of large leaves, ex- 

 hibit a noblr appearance. The most eli- 

 gible situation for these trees is in lawns 

 and parks, where, they m:iy be planted 

 singly, and where their fruit will be ser- 

 \ircable. to the deer, who are fond of it. 

 This tree is of quick growth; and in a 



.irs it will afford a good shade in 

 summer, and yield plenty of flowers. 

 Trees, r.tise-d from nuts, have in 12 or 14 

 years become large enough to shade two 

 or three chairs with their branches, which 

 in the season are covered with flowers. 

 Rut the trees are of short duration, and 

 the wood is of little value. It serves, 

 IT, for water-pipes, turners' ware, 

 and fuel : and for these uses it is worth 

 the charge of planting, and should be 

 felled in November or December. The 

 horse-chestnut has been employed in 

 France and Switzerland for the purpose 

 of bleaching yarn ; and it is recommend- 

 ed in the Memoirs of the Society of Berne, 

 \ol.ll. part 2, as capable of extensive 

 use in whitening not only flax and hemp, 

 but silk and wool. H contain! an astrin- 



.;ionaceoiis juice, whichis obtained 

 by peeling the nuts, and grinding or rasp- 

 ing them. They are then mixed with hot 

 rain or running water, in the proportion 

 of 20 nuts to 10 or 12 quarts of water. 

 Wove caps and stockings were milled in 

 ihis water, and took the die extremely- 

 well ; and successful trials were made of 

 it in fulling stuffs and cloths. Linen 

 washed in this water takes a pleasing 



ky-blue colour; and the filaments 

 of hemp, steeped in it some davx 

 asih separated. The author of the me- 

 moir, above referred to, imagines that if 

 the meal of the chestnut could be made 

 iito cakes or balls, it would answer the 

 purposes of soap, in washing and fulling. 



'Urneiit, after infusion, loses itsbit- 



, and becomes good food for fowls 

 when mixed with bran. The Edinburgh 

 College have admitted the horse-chestnut 

 into their Pharmacopoeia of ITtv!, on the 

 recommendation of Dr. Gardiner, who 

 says that three or four grains of the pow- 

 der, snuffed up the nostrils in the evening, 

 operate next morning as an excellent ster- 

 nutatory, and thereby proves very benefi- 

 cial in obstinate inflammations of the eyes. 

 A patent was granted in 1796, to Lord 

 N . Murray, for his discovery of a method 

 <>t extracting starch from horse-chestnuts. 



The second species, oryellow-flov 

 horse-chestnut, is a native of North Caro- 

 lina, was cultivated with us in 1764, and 

 flou 



The third species, or scarlet horse- 

 chestnut, rises to the height of t\\ent) 

 ithout much extending its branch- 

 es ; its bark is smooth, and the i 

 which are opposite, on long, red petioles, 

 are of a light green. 



The common horse-chestnut is propa- 

 gated by sowing the nuts, after preserv- 

 ingthem in sand during the winter : but 

 the scarlet is propagated by grafting it up- 

 on stocks of the common horse-chestnut. 



The American species are : JE. paria ; 

 JE. flava; JE. macrostachya; and JE. achi- 

 nata. Of the last there are two varieties, 

 .?. the glabra, and B. the pallida. 



.SETHI'S A, in botany, a genus of the 

 Pentandria Digynia class and order, and 

 belonging 1 to the natural order of Umbel- 

 latse or Umbellifera- : the calyx is an uni- 

 versal spreading umbel, and the partial 

 is also spreading, but small; having no 

 universal involucre, and the partial one 

 placed on the outside, and consisting only 

 of three very long, linear, pendulous leaf- 

 lets, and the proper perianthium scarcely 

 observable : the universal corolla is nearly 

 uniform, with all the floscules fertile, and 

 the partial has the petals bent in, heart- 

 shaped, and unequal : the stamina are 

 simple filaments, with roundish anthers ; 

 the pistillum is an inferior germ, and the 

 stylos are reflex, with obtuse stigmas: 

 it has no pcricarpium, and the fruit is 

 roundish, streaked, and bipartite : the 

 seeds are two, roundish, streaked, except 

 on a third part of the surface, which is 

 plain. There are four species, the prin- 

 cipal is JE. cynapium, common fool's pars- 

 ley, or lesser hemlock, which isacommon 

 weed in fields and kitchen-gardens, and 

 in a slight degree poisonous. It is 

 distinguished when in flower, in July and 

 August, from true parsley and chenil. 

 by the three narrow pendent leaflets of 

 the involucre, placed on the outer part 

 only of the umbel, and by its being a much 

 humbler plant than either of the others 

 The leaves also, in an i arlier state, areol 

 a different form and a dsrker hue, and, 

 when bruised, emit in a slight degree a 

 disagreeable venomous smell. Th 

 way to avoid doubt or danger is to culti- 

 vate the curled p. 

 it, but it is said to be noxious to geese. 



JETIOLOGY, that branch of pliyslr 

 which . 



this sense we say the aetiology of the small 

 pox, dropsy, &c. 



JErinLon\, in rhetoric, is dee 

 figure of speech, whereby, in relating an 

 event, we, at th-> same time, unfold the 

 of it. 



