iv.] OF THE ANCIENTS. 135 



the previous stages of hunter and pastoral life, we 

 must adopt the early traditions which represent 

 them as living upon acorns, beech -nuts, and 

 chesnuts. 



Thus Lucretius : 



" Glandiferas later curabant corpora quercus 

 Plerumque ; efc, quse nunc hiberno tempore cernis, 

 Arbuta puniceo fieri matura colore, 

 Plurima turn tellus, etiam majora ferebat ; 

 Multaque prjeterea novitas turn florida mundi 

 Pabula dia tulit, miseris mortalibus ampla v ." 



" But acorn-meals chief culled they from the sheds 

 Of forest oaks ; and in their wintry months, 

 The wide wood-whortle with its purple fruit 

 Fed them, then larger and more amply poured, 

 And many a boon besides, now long extinct, 

 The fresh-formed earth her hapless offspring dealt." 



As Decandolle observes, the mere conveyance of 

 the seeds of amentaceous and coniferous plants 

 across an arm of the sea by natural causes is almost 

 inconceivable, and the spontaneous establishment 

 of a forest of such trees absolutely impossible, un- 

 less man took the trouble of bringing it about; 

 whilst the extension of such forests in the early 

 ages of Greece and Rome would seem to throw 

 back their antiquity to a date, when the human 

 race was too rude and unsettled to have attempted 

 such an undertaking. 



Chesnuts then, as well as the other Cupuliferce 

 which are found in forests throughout Europe, may 

 fairly be regarded, in spite of the authority of 



* Lib. v. 937942. 



