29 



^ESCULACE^E. 



Asia,*and that its introduction into Europe took place about 

 the middle of the sixteenth century : Clusius informs us that 

 at Vienna, in 1558, there was a plant of this species that 

 had been brought there twelve years before, and our coun- 

 tryman Gerard, in 1579, the first of our writers who men- 

 tions it, speaks of it in his Herbal as a rare foreign tree ; 

 and as his description is minute and particular in regard 

 to its growth, foliage, &c, we may thence suppose that a 

 specimen, or specimens of it had at that time attained a 

 considerable size, and even flowered in England, a suppo- 

 sition which would accord with the statement of M. Bom 

 St. Hilaire, that the Horse-chesnut was brought from the 

 mountains of Thibet to England, in 1550, and from thence 

 to Vienna in 15-58.-|* In France it was not known before 

 1615, when it was first raised from nuts procured from 

 the Levant. We afterwards find it mentioned in Johnson's 

 edition of Gerard, 1633, as then growing in Mr. Trades- 

 cant's garden at South Lambeth ; from this period till the 

 time of Miller it appears to have attracted great attention, 

 and acquired a high reputation as an ornamental tree, as 

 he states it in 1731 to be very common in England, and 

 extensively used in the formation of avenues and public 

 walks. In Scotland it appears to have been introduced 

 between 1630 and 1610, if the age of the two trees grow- 

 ing at Dawick, the seat of Sir John Murray Nasmyth, 

 mentioned by Sir T. D. Lauder, and considered to be the 

 oldest in Scotland, is correct. It is still very generally, 

 though not numerously introduced as an ornamental tree 

 in parks, and near the mansions of our gentry, and often 

 with excellent and splendid effect ; for in addition to its 



* Mr. Royle, however, in his illustrations, says he never met with the common 

 Horse-chesnut in the mountainous parts of Northern India, though there the Pavia 

 or Indian Chesnut is abundant. 



+ " Memoire sur les Marrons D'Inde. " 



