232 A DISCOURSE 



BOOK I. annuated hollow trees,) is gotten the best mould for the raising of divers 

 -"^^^r-^ seedlings of the rarest plants and flowers ; to say nothing here of the 

 Magisterial Fasces, for which, anciently, the cudgels were used by the 

 Lictor, as now the gentler rods by our tyrannical Pedagogues, for lighter 

 faults. 



3. I should here add the uses of the water too, had I full permission to 

 tamper with all the medicinal virtues of trees ; but if the sovereign effects 

 of the juice of this despicable tree supply its other defects, (which make 

 some judge it unworthy to be brought into the catalogue of woods to be 

 propagated,) I may perhaps, for once, be permitted to play the empiric, 

 and to gratify our laborious woodman with a draught of his own liquor; 

 and the rather, because these kinds of secrets are not yet sufficiently culti- 

 vated ; and ingenious planters should by all means be encouraged to make 

 more trials of this nature, as the Indians and other nations have done on 

 their Palms and trees of several kinds, to their great emolument. The 

 mystery is no more than this : About the beginning of March, (when the 

 buds begin to be proud and turgid, and before they expand into leaves,) 

 with a chisel and a mallet, cut a slit almost as deep as the very pith, 

 under some bough or branch of a well-spreading Birch ; cut it oblique, 

 and not long-ways, (as a good surgeon would make his orifice in a vein,) 

 inserting a small stone or chip^ to keep the lips of the wound a little open. 

 Sir Hugh Piatt, (giving a general rule for the gathering of sap and tap- 

 ping of trees,) would have it done within one foot of the ground, the first 

 rind taken off, and then the white bark slit over-thwart, no farther than 

 to the body of the tree : Moreover, that this wound be made only in that 

 part of the bark which respects the south, west, or between those quar- 

 ters ; because, says he, little or no sap riseth from the northern, nor in- 

 deed when the east wind blows. In this slit, by the help of your 

 knife to open it, he directs that a leaf of the tree be inserted, first fitted 

 to the dimensions of the slit, from which the sap will distil in manner of 

 filtration. Take away the leaf, and the bark will close again, a little 

 earth being clapped to the slit. Thus the Knight, for any tree. We 

 have already shown how the Birch is to be treated : Fasten therefore a 

 bottle, or some such convenient vessel appendant ; this does the effect 

 as well as perforation, or tapping : Out of this aperture will extil a 

 limpid and clear water, retaining art obscure smack both of the taste and 

 odour of the tree ; which (as I am credibly informed) will, in the space of 



