56 AUBREY'S NATURAL HISTORY OF WILTSHIRE. 



Hazel Wee have two sorts of them. In the south part, and particularly Cranbourn Chase, 

 the hazells are white and tough ; with which there are made the best hurdles of England. The nutts 

 of the chase are of great note, and are sold yearly beyond sea. They sell them at Woodbery Hill 

 Faire, &c. ; and the price of them is the price of a buschell of wheate. The hazell-trees in North 

 Wilts are red, and not so tough, more brittle. 



Coven-tree common about Chalke and Cranbourn Chase : the carters doe make their whippes of it 

 It growes no higher than a cherry-tree. 



Buckthorne very common in South Wiltshire. The apothecaries make great use of the berries, 

 and the glovers use it to colour their leather yellow. 



Prick-timber (euonymus). Tliis tree is common, especially in North Wilts. The butchers doe 

 make skewers of it, because it doth not taint the meate as other wood will doe : from whence it 

 hath the name of prick-timber. 



Osiers. Wee have great plenty of them about Bemarton, &c. near Salisbury, where the osier 

 beds doe yield four pounds per acre. 



Service-trees grow naturally in Grettwood, in the parish of Gretenham, belonging to George 

 Ayliffe, Esq. In the parke of Kington St. Michel is onely one. At the foot of Hedington Hill, 

 and also at the bottome of the hill at Whitesheet, which is the same range of hill, doe growe at least 

 twenty cervise-trees. They operate as medlars, but less effectually. 



Pliny, lib. xv. c. 21. De Sorbis. Quartum genus terminate appellatur, remedio tantuin probabile, 

 assiduum proventu minimumq} porno, arbore dissimili foliis plane platani. Lib. xvi. cap. 18. Gaudet 

 frigidis Sorbu-s sed magis betulla. Dr. Gale, R.S.S. tells me that Sorbiodunum, now Old Sarum, 

 has its denomination from sorbes ; but the ground now below the castle is all turned to arable. 



Elders grow every where. At Bradford the side of the high hill which faces the south, about 

 Mr. Paul Methwin's house, is covered with them. I fancy that that pent might be turned to better 

 profit, for it is situated as well for a vinyard as any place can be, and is on a rocky gravelly ground. 

 The apothecaries well know the use of the berries, and so doe the vintners, who buy vast quantities 

 of them in London, and some doe make no inconsiderable profit by the sale of them. 



At the parsonage house at Wyley growes an ash out of the mortar of the wall of the house, and 

 it flourishes very well and is verdant. It was nine yeares old in 1686. I doe not insert this as a 

 rarity; but 'tis strange to consider that it hath its growth and nourishment from the aire, for from 

 the lime it can receive none. [In August 1847, I observed a large and venerable ash tree growing 

 out of and united with the ancient Roman walls of Caistor, near Norwich. The whole of the base of 

 the trunk was incorporated with bricks, rubble, and mortar ; but the roots no doubt extended many 

 yards into the adjacent soil. J. B.] 



Whitty-tree, or wayfaring-tree, is rare in this country ; some few in Cranbourn Chace, and three 

 or four on the south downe of the farme of Broad Chalke. In Herefordshire they are not un- 

 common ; and they used, when I was a boy, to make pinnes for the yoakes of their oxen of them, 



