the Quercus and Fagus of the Ancients. 13 



If the account of the Greek iEgilops be allowed to approximate this de- 

 scription of the Latin Esculus, so it may be safely said, that no sort of oak, with 

 which we are acquainted, merits the sublime tribute of admiration conveyed 

 in the verses of Virgil, unless it is our own magnificent tree, the monarch of 

 our woods, for which all Britons still retain a druidical veneration, and would 

 fain believe that its growth in our island surpasses that in all other countries. 

 Throughout the greater part of Europe, however, the oak attains a mag- 

 nitude beyond that of other trees. Arthur Young, viewing the woods of 

 Lombardy, asserts {Travels, ii. 218.) that we have no right to arrogate to 

 ourselves the exclusive possession of the finest oak timber. The primitive 

 forests of Lombardy, in the days of Polybius {Hist., ii. 15.), afforded pannage 

 to innumerable hogs, the supply of the Roman markets, and the same un- 

 disturbed district might, as late as the time of Virgil, have furnished the 

 poet with specimens of oaks, 



" Sive Padi ripis, Athesim seu propter amcenum," 



worthy of the splendid portrait he has drawn. If the Greek iEgilops and 

 Latin Esculus are not our common oak, it would be difficult to say what 

 tree was intended by those names, or by what name our oak was known to 

 the Greeks and Romans. Horace in speaking of Daunia, and Garganum a 

 part of Daunia, seems to use Esculeta and Querceta indifferently, as if 

 synonymous. The greater part of Daunia is an open champaign country ; but 

 the promontory of Garganum, now St. Angelo, was visited by Swinburne 

 {Travels, i. 155.), and found still to contain a respectable forest, composed, 

 besides pines, &c, of the evergreen and common oak. 



3. We come now to the Platyphyllos, or Latifolia, next in the list of Theo- 

 phrastus ; and this, far more reasonably than his iEgilops, agrees with what 

 we know of the Valanida ; even the broadness of the leaf, from which its 

 name is derived, does not oppose the suggestion. 



4. We have, fourthly, to seek for the modern analogue of the Haliphlcsos, 

 and it may be found, perhaps, in another remarkable oak of the Idaean group. 

 The Quercus infectoria, which produces the gall-nut of commerce, and is of 

 little value for any thing else, is described by Olivier {Travels, ii. 41.) as 

 bearing a crooked stem, and seldom reaching the height of 6 ft., which is not 

 at variance with the dwarfish Haliphlceos of Theophrastus. 



5. The Phegos now remains for consideration, and with its sweet and 

 spherical fruit can be ascribed to no glandiferous tree now known, unless 

 it be the sweet chestnut. The objection which first and naturally presents 

 itself to this conjecture is, that Theophrastus is supposed to have described 

 the sweet chestnut under the name of Dios Balanum * {Plin. JV. H., xv. 25.): 

 but the Phegos was in all likelihood a wilder sort, indigenous to the Greek 

 mountains ; while the Dios Balanos, we are told, was a superior species, 

 improved by cultivation, and introduced originally from Asia. " Sardibus 

 eaa provenere primum. Ideo apud Graecos Sardianos Balanos appellant : 

 nam Dios Balanum postea imposuere excellentioribus satu factis." Presum- 

 ing this to have been the case, and finding nothing in what we call the oak 

 tribe to accord with the Phegos of Theophrastus, it will be worth while to 

 examine how far his Phegos, and the Phegos of other early Greek authors. 



Ergo non hiemes illam, non flabra, neque imbres 

 Convellunt : immota manet, multosque nepotes, 

 Multa virum volvens durando saecula vincit. 

 Turn fortes late ramos et brachia tendens 

 Hue illuc, media ipsa ingentem sustinet umbram." 



Gear., ii. 291. 

 * So it is supposed; but it appears to me as if Kapva, or Kapva 'HpaKXecorlicri 

 were the sweet chestnut (the Asiatic sort), and that the Aioq (iaXavoc of Theo- 

 phrastus meant the Jovis glans, Juglans, or walnut. See note at p, 20. 



