15 



PART I. 



GENERAL OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF THE 

 TREES AND SHRUBS OF TEMPERATE CLIMATES. 



THE use of the slight general outline which we propose now 

 submitting to the reader is, partly, to show the consideration 

 in which trees have been held in all ages and countries; but 

 principally to record what has been done in the introduction of 

 foreign trees into Britain ; and to point out, from the ligneous 

 productions of other countries having similar climates, what 

 remains to be accomplished. We shall first notice to what 

 extent a love for, and a knowledge of, trees existed among the 

 nations of antiquity ; and, next, give a general idea of the indi- 

 genous and introduced trees of those countries occupied by the 

 modern nations of Europe. We shall commence with Britain ; 

 and shall take, in succession, France, Germany, and the other 

 European countries. Afterwards, we shall give a slight sketch 

 of the trees suited to temperate climates which are natives of 

 Asia, Africa, America, and Australia. 



CHAP. I. 



OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF TREES AND SHRUBS WHICH EXISTED AMONG 

 THE NATIONS OF ANTIQUITY. 



THE first notices which we have of trees are in the Sacred 

 Writings. The tree of knowledge, and the circumstance of our 

 first parents hiding themselves among the trees of the garden of 

 Eden, are familiar to every one. Solomon appears to have col- 

 lected all kinds of plants, and not only to have had an orchard 

 of fruit trees, and trees bearing spices, but to have included in 

 his grounds what are called barren trees, and among these the 

 cedar. As this tree is a native of a cold and mountainous 

 country at some distance from Judea, it shows that the practice 

 of collecting trees from a distance, and from a different climate, 

 to assemble them in one plantation or arboretum, is of the 

 earliest date. The cedar, indeed, is frequently mentioned in 

 Scripture; and both that and the fir (including, under this 

 name, probably both Pin us and ^bies, for some species of both 

 are natives of Asia Minor and Greece) are said, in the book of 

 Ezekiel, to be frequent in magnificent gardens. Large trees 

 were then used as places for meeting under (as they are, in the 

 East, to this day); and they were then, as now, planted in 

 cemeteries 



