BEECH.-FAGUS. 



A Genus of the Castanea, or Chestnut Tree? 

 and of the Class Moncccia Polyandria. 



THE beech is one of the handsomest of our 

 native forest-trees, which, in stateliness and 

 grandeur of outline, vies with the oak. It 

 seems to have been greatly admired by the 

 ancients. Pliny says, "There was a little 

 hill called Carne, in the territory of Tuscu- 

 lum, not far from the city of Rome, that 

 was clad and beautified with a grove and 

 tufts of beech-trees, which were as even and 

 round in the head as if they had been cu- 

 riously trimmed with garden shears/' He 

 adds, " this grove was, in old times, conse- 

 crated to Diana, by the common consent of 

 all the inhabitants of Latium, who paid their 

 devotions there." This author mentions one 

 of these beech-trees, of such beauty, that 

 Passienus Crispus, an excellent orator, who 



