OF FOREST-TREES. 



299 



of both sexes, whereof the male growing lower, with a rounder shape, CH. XXII. 

 hath its wood more knotty and rude than the female ; it is lank, longer, "-^^y"^ 

 narrow, and pointed ; bears a black, thick, large cone, including the 

 kernel with an hard shell, covered under a thick scale : The nuts of this 

 tree, (not much inferior to the almond,) are used, among other ingredients, 

 • in beatilla-pies at the best tables. They should be gathered in June 

 before they gape ; and having hung two years, (for there will be always 

 some ripe, and some green on the same tree,) preserve them in their nuts 

 in sand, as you treat acorns, &;c. till the season invite, and then set or 

 sow them in ground which is cultivated like the Fir in most respects ; 

 only you may bury the nuts a little deeper. By a friend of mine they 

 were rolled in a fine compost made of sheep-dung, and scattered in 

 February, and this way never failed Fir and Pine ; they came to be above 

 an inch high by May ; and a Spanish author tells us, that to macerate them 

 five days in a child's urine, and three days in water, is of wonderful 

 effect : This were an expeditious process for great plantations ; unless 



" These are three arguments which are all sufficiently convincing of themselves : These 

 " are three arguments which, springing from as many different sources, all happily unite 

 ''together in one common channel, and form together an irresistible tide of evidence. 

 " And a fact which relates to the remotest antiquity, and which is asserted against the 

 " highest historical authority, cannot be too powerfully demonstrated. The Fir then was 

 " one of the trees of Britain before the arrival of the Romans among us." 



The Pine was sacred to Cybele, who turned her beloved Attis into that tree : 



Et succincta comas, hirsutaque vertice Pinus ; 

 Grata Deum matri. Siquidem Cybeleilis Attis 



Exuit hac hominem, truncoque induruit illo. ovid. met. 



It was a custom among the ancients, when they gave over any employment, to devote 

 their instruments, and hang them up in some sacred place. Virgil alludes to this custom 

 when he makes Corydon say. 



Hie arguta sacra pendebit fistula Pinu. ecl. vii. 



Pendebatque vagi pastoris in arbore votum 



Garrula sylvestri fistula sacra Deo. propert. 



Some years ago, a stone was discovered in Provence, in France, on which was figured a 

 Pine-tree with all the symbols of Cybele and Attis. Two tympanums hang on the 

 branches of the tree on one side> and on the other a pastordl pipe, agreeable to ancient 

 custom. MONTFAUCON, vol. i. 



Yy 2 



