NUTS. 285 



In England it is chiefly grown in hop counties, or around 

 orchards, especially in Devonshire. The deeply serrated 

 pale green shining leaves are on old trees only from 4 to 

 6 in. in length, but on young shoots they are often nearly 

 a foot long, and 3 or 4 in. broad, and it is a singular fact 

 that in both wild and cultivated varieties they always 

 grow broader in English as compared with French trees, 

 a peculiarity which has been noticed also in the leaves of 

 some other kinds of trees. In France there are two very 

 distinct varieties of the Chestnut, les Chataignes and les 

 Marrons, the former being to the latter about what the 

 crab is to the apple, so vastly inferior are they in flavour 

 as well as in size, three of these Cnataignes being usually 

 found in one common envelope, whereas the Marrons ordi- 

 narily sit in solitary dignity, one in each husk. The city 

 of Lyons being the chief entrepot for the latter, they are 

 commonly called Marrons de Lyons. At Tortworth, in 

 Gloucestershire, there is a Chestnut reckoned to be both 

 the largest and oldest tree in England, tradition carrying 

 back its origin to the heptarchic days of Saxon Egbert, 

 while its trunk measures 45 ft. in circumference. 



A similar position to that which the Chestnut occupies 

 in particular localities in Europe is held in some parts of 

 the 2sTew World by the Juvia-tree, which furnishes what 

 are called Brazil Nuts, sometimes also prettily termed 

 the " Almonds of the Amazon." The gathering of these 

 nuts is celebrated among the Indians by a festival called 

 la fiesta de las juvias, something similar to our harvest- 

 home, but signalized by great excesses feasting on 

 roasted monkeys, dancing and drinking, forming the chief 

 amusements, and the men being commonly in a state of 

 complete intoxication throughout the two days of the 

 fete. The tree, baptized by Humboldt with the name of 

 Bertliollia excelsa, may almost be said to have been dis- 

 covered by that eminent traveller, so meagre was the 

 information concerning it before his description was made 

 public ; for though the triangular seeds were early known 

 in Europe, and had even been an article of commerce * 



* Our present import of these nuts was recently reckoned to amount to 

 11,700 bushels per annum. 



