THE CHESTNUT. 63 



and on the Pyrenees some two or three hundred feet 

 higher. 



There are old trees of immense size almost every- 

 where in the milder regions of Europe, and the cele- 

 brated monarchs of Etna have been many times de- 

 scribed by travelers. The largest measure one hundred 

 and eighty feet in circumference near the root. All the 

 early Roman writers who have anything to say about 

 rural affairs, mention the chestnut as one of their val- 

 uable trees, producing nuts used for various purposes. 

 Pliny enumerates eight varieties, but Columella appears 

 to place more value upon the timber, especially the 

 sprouts, for stakes, than he does on the nuts. But long 

 before the Romans began to cultivate the chestnut, the 

 Greeks held it in high esteem under the name of Sardi- 

 anos Balanos or Sardis nut, and still later it was called 

 Dios Balanos Lopimon. 



The European chestnut has been so frequently and 

 extensively referred to by ancient and modern authors 

 that it would not be at all difficult to fill a large volume 

 with, brief extracts from their works, but my aim is not 

 so much to show what has been done with this nut in 

 other countries as what we may do with it here. All 

 nations who have any experience with it admit its value 

 as food for many wild and domesticated animals, as well 

 as for the human race, and we know, from our long 

 experience with the native species, that it is highly 

 esteemed wherever known, although it must be admitted 

 that our sparse population and the abundance of 

 other kinds of food, have tended to make us careless 

 and neglectful of the indigenous chestnut. 



It may be well, before dismissing this brief history 

 of ^he chestnut, to add that while nearly all the ancient 

 authors, in referring to it, employed its present scien- 

 tific name of Castanea, still, when botanists first at- 

 tempted what has since been recognized as the scientific 



