120 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



Lime Tilia Europaa. 



Lime Tree (communis). It is an exceedingly beauti- 

 ful tree, grows fast, and attains a very great size. It 

 is not supposed to be a native of England, but 

 mention is made of its growing here, as early as 

 the middle of the sixteenth century. In Switzer- 

 land and Germany there are lime trees of an enor- 

 mous size ; and one, in the county of Norfolk, is 

 mentioned by Sir Thomas Brown as being ninety 

 feet high, with a trunk forty-eight feet in circum- 

 ference, at a foot and a half from the ground. 



The lime bears the smoke of cities better than any 

 other tall-growing forest tree ; and for this reason the 

 shaded walks about the cities on the Continent, more 

 especially in Germany, are planted with it. It has 

 other advantages: the trunk is smooth; the leaves 

 are of a most beautifully delicate green; the flowers 

 throw out a very agreeable fragrance; and it is not 

 so liable to get unsightly, from wounds and decayed 

 branches, as almost any other tree. But its leaves 

 come late in the spring, and they begin to fall early, 

 as early sometimes as the month of July. 



Though a soft and weak timber, the lime is valu- 



