80 FAMILIAR TREES 



is known in the Isle of Wight as Stink-tree. Never- 

 theless, the juicy, tempting-looking berries are mixed 

 with honey and flour and eaten in Siberia and in 

 Scandinavia, as well as distilled for spirit. 



The toughness of its even-grained wood and its 

 long flexible shoots have led to its use for weavers' 

 combs, shoe-pegs, whip-switches, and the stems of 

 tobacco-pipes, and to its sharing with Gornus and 

 Euon'ymus such names as Dogwood, Gatten, Gadrise, 

 Gatteridge, and Whipcrop. Its stems are imported 

 from South-Eastern Europe under the names of Teazle 

 or Balkan Rose for walking-sticks and umbrella- 

 handles. Being, however, a less familiar tree than 

 the Elder, which it somewhat resembles in its 

 blossoms, and the Rowan, to which it may be com- 

 pared when in fruit, it has acquired the names of 

 Dog-eller, Red (that is, red-fruited) Elder, and Dog- 

 rowan, " dog " as a prefix constantly in plant-names 

 signifying merely "spurious." The general likeness 

 to the Elder seems to have attracted the attention 

 of botanists at a somewhat early date ; and such 

 names as Water Elder and Marsh Elder have long 

 been applied to it in English, and the equivalent 

 Wasserholder in German. 



William Turner did not know this as an English 

 tree, and speaks of it under what is now its specific 

 name— Op'uZtts, which seems to be a curious mediaeval 

 variant of Pop'ulus. In his " Names of Herbes " 

 (1548), he writes: " Opulus is a tree commune in 

 Italy and Germany, but I have not sene it that I 

 remembre in Englande, It is called in frenche as 

 Gesnere sayeth opier, and so maye it be also called 

 in englishe tyl we fynde a better name.'' 



