THE PLANE TREE. 363 
ing to Royle, it extends southward as far as Cashmere. It 
was introduced into Britain about the middle of the sixteenth 
century. The branches of the tree are wide-spreading. The 
leaves are five-lobed, palmate, with the divisions lanceolate. 
On young, vigorous shoots they are frequently upwards of a 
foot broad, and ten inches long; but in old trees of less vigour 
they are not much beyond half of these dimensions. The tree 
blossoms in May, and in favourable seasons ripens its seeds in 
October. The beauty of the tree is celebrated in the earliest 
records of Grecian history. Herodotus and Elian tell us that 
when Xerxes invaded Greece, he was so enchanted with a 
beautiful plane tree in Lycia, that he encircled it with a collar 
of gold, adorned it with jewels, necklaces, scarfs, and infinite 
riches ; confided the charge of it to one of the ten thousand, 
caused a figure of it to be stamped on a medal of gold; and, 
by compelling his whole army to encamp in its neighourhood 
for days, occasioned a delay which was the cause of his defeat. 
The embowering shades which were formed around the schools 
of Athens, the groves of Epicurus, the shady walks planted 
near the Gymnasium and other public buildings, the groves of 
Academus, in which Plato delivered his celebrated discourses, 
were all formed of the plane tree ; and the enthusiasm of the 
Greeks and Romans is said to have been more extravagant in 
the cultivation of this than of any other tree. All travellers 
in the East have been enchanted by its grandeur and graceful- 
ness. Lamartine says that near Constantinople three-decked 
vessels are constructed and launched into the sea under the very 
shadow of the plane. It is the most gigantic vegetable produc- 
tion on the banks of the Bosporus, embellishing the beautiful 
meadow of Buyukdere with trees of immense size, “one of 
which would overshadow a regiment.” A distinguished tree 
at this place is recorded by many writers, the trunk of which 
presents the appearance of seven or eight trees, having a com- 
mon origin, like that of shoots from a stool. Some of the 
trunks proceed from the surface, others as high as seven or 
eight feet; the circumference at the base is 141 feet, and its 
branches extend over a space of 130 feet in diameter, which, 
