THE WALNUT. 341 
of transplanted trees ranging nearer the surface of the ground, 
and more under the influence of sunshine. Trees that are of 
a great age are also found, in a late climate, to ripen their 
fruit better than young trees in the same locality, unless the 
latter have been frequently transplanted, which has the effect 
of occasioning their sap to flow less copiously, and imparts a 
ripening tendency. 
Large quantities of fruit are yearly imported into Britain 
from France and Spain, to an extent varying according to the 
crops in the respective countries. It is recorded in the history 
of this tree that the winter of 1709 was very fatal to the 
walnut throughout Europe, and occasioned so great a scarcity 
of its timber that in 1720 an Act was passed in France to 
prevent its exportation, and the extensive propagation of the 
tree was encouraged by the French Government. 
Throughout Britain the walnut attains to the size of a large 
timber tree. It is of great duration, and, when grown in 
sufficient space, in old age it presents a picturesque and 
elegant form, with ramifications resembling that of the oak. 
Many fine specimens of the tree are to be found throughout 
Britain. Inthe north of Scotland it attains a greater size 
than any other fruit-tree. At Gordon Castle, Banffshire, it 
stands sixty-six feet high, with a trunk eleven feet in circum- 
ference at three feet from the ground, and yields fruit abun- 
dantly. At Altyre House, Morayshire, a tree has attained 
the height of sixty-two feet, with a trunk four feet in diameter, 
and contains about 200 cubical feet of timber. The soil is a 
deep sandy loam incumbent on gravel. It yields large crops 
of fruit, which ripen almost every year. There are other trees 
in Morayshire of nearly similar dimensions, but on account of 
the soil and situation which they occupy being somewhat 
later, it is only in very favourable seasons that their fruit 
becomes fit for dessert. 
The timber of the common walnut, when young, is white 
and soft, but as it advances in age it gets more dark and 
solid, and ultimately it becomes shaded and veined, of a light 
brown and black ; and generally the pieces most ornamental 
