OF FOREST-TREES. 



261 



The best season for the fetching home of other fuel is in June, the CHAP 

 ways being then most dry and passable ; yet I know some good husbands 

 will begin rather in May, because fallowing and stirring of ground for 

 corn comes in the ensuing months, and the days are long enough, and 

 swains have then least to do. 



And thus we have seen how for house-bote, and ship-bote, plough- 

 bote, hey-bote, and fire-bote, the planting and propagation of timber 

 and forest-trees is requisite ; so as it was not for nothing that the very 

 name (which the Greeks generally applied to timber) O.yj, by synecdoche, 

 was taken always pro materia ; since we hardly find any thing in Nature 

 more universally useful ; or, in comparison with it, deserving the name 

 of material ; it being, in truth, the mother-parent and (metaphorically) 

 the passive principle ready for the form. 



To complete this chapter of the universal use of trees, and the parts 

 of them, something I could be tempted to say concerning staves, 

 wands, &c. their antiquity, use, divine, domestic, civil, and political ; 

 the time of cutting, manner of seasoning, forming, and other curious 

 particulars, (how dry soever the subject may appear,) both of delight and 

 profit ; but we reserve it for some more fit opportunity, and perhaps it 

 may merit a peculiar treatise, as acceptable as it will prove amusing. 



We have abeady spoken of that modern art of tapping trees in the 

 spring, by which, doubtless, some excellent and specific medicines may 

 be attained, as (before) from the Birch, for the stone ; from Elms and 

 Elder, against fevers ; so from the Vine, the Oak, and even the very 

 Bramble, besides the wholesome and pleasant drinks, spirits, &c. that 

 may possibly be educed out of them. This we leave to the industrious ; 

 satisfying ourselves that we have been among the first who have hinted 

 and published the ways of performing it. 



Let us now sum up all the good qualities and transcendent perfections 

 of trees, in the harmonious Poets' Concert of Elogies : 



■ — dant utile lignilm 



Navigiis Pinos, domibus Cedrosqae Cupressosque ; 

 Hinc radios trivere rotis, hinc tympana plaustris 

 Agricolse, et pandas ratibus posuere carinas. 

 Volume II. LI 



