APPENDIX. 175 



known under the name of serre (mclosure). 

 Matioli says that in his time they cultivated the 

 oranges in Italy on the shores of the sea and of the 

 most famous lakes, as well as in the gardens of the 

 interior, but he says nothing of the places for shel- 

 tering them. Gallo speaks of rooms designed to 

 receive the boxes of orange trees, which were very 

 numerous at Brescia, but he does not designate 

 them by any particular name. The Latin writers 

 also used a periphrase. Ferraris calls an orangery 

 tectum hibernum. Others call it cella cilraria.} 



This agricultural luxury was unknown in Europe 

 before the introduction of the citron tree. We 

 find not the least trace of it either in Greek or Latin 

 writers. 



It is true that from the time of the Emperor 

 Tiberius in Rome they inclosed melons in certain 

 portable boxes of wood, which were exposed to the 

 sun in winter to make the fruit grow out of season. 

 These inclosures were secured from the effects ot 

 cold by sashes or frames, and received the sun's 

 rays through diaphanous stones (specular to), which 

 held the place of our glass. But it seems they used 

 no fire for heating them, and that they merely in- 

 closed thus indigenous plants, of which they wished 

 to force the fruiting out of season, it being a spec- 

 ulation of the cultivator rather than a luxurious 

 ornament for embellishing the gardens. (Pliny, 

 bk. 19, chap. 5, p. 336, and Columell, bk. 2, 

 chap. 3, p. 42.) It is after the introduction of 



