THE YOUNG NATUEALIST. 



159 



else it is allowed to ooze out and spread down the stem, when it quickly dries 

 and is removed in the form of flakes. The modern manna has, of coarse, no 

 affinity with the manna of the Israelites in the Wilderness, but is a sweet 

 substance, employed as a gentle laxative especially suitable for children. It 

 derives its properties from a peculiar substance called mannite, which differs 

 from other sugars in that it does not ferment with yeast and water as they 

 freely do. 



Without exception, there is none of our forest trees around which so many 

 legends, superstitions, and folk-lore stories cluster as the ash. Our space 

 will only admit of the merest outline of these numerous fables. It is the 

 sacred tree of Scandinavian mythology, whose roots ran in three directions, 

 one towards heaven, another towards the nether world, and the other towards 

 the frost giants. Underneath its roots was a fountain of wonderful virtue, in 

 which wisdom lay concealed. Odin gave one of his eyes to be permitted to 

 drink of its water, and the draught made him the wisest of Gods ; and Odin 

 formed the first man from a block of ashwood. In this connection it may be 

 interesting to note that the ash is only once mentioned in the Scriptures, 

 Isaiah xliv. 14, where, amongst the other elaborate preparations of the idol 

 maker, it is said " He planteth an ash, the rain doth nourish it, ;; &c. The 

 Teutonic association of ideas with the ash as a suitable image-making tree 

 seems to have influenced our old translators of the Bible, for in the revised 

 version ash is relegated to the margin, whilst "fir-tree" is substituted in the 

 text. The change is doubtless desirable/ as the ash is not a native of Pales- 

 tine, although the manna ash is planted there. According to the gipsies the 

 cross was made of an ash tree. In ancient times, when war was the occu- 

 pation of nations and the sword and spear their chief weapons, from the 

 toughness of its wood the ash was an important tree, as of it the spear shafts 

 were fashioned. The Anglo-Saxon name for the tree was cesc, and that term 

 soon came to be applied to the weapon as well, so cesc meant a spear, and 

 cesc pleg the game of spears — a battle. In process of time the name was 

 transferred to the warrior himself, who was called an cesc, hence our surname 

 Ashman would be synonymous with spearman. When the hardy Norsemen 

 overran various tracts of Britain, they implanted many of their customs, and 

 when they divided the land they marked it out with fences and hedges, of 

 which the ash was a principal tree from its various uses and associations. It 

 was made a statutory obligation in the tenure of many lands to keep up the 

 number of ash trees by successive plantings. This accounts for the preva- 

 lence of ash trees about old homesteads and boundaries, of which sometimes 

 these venerable trees are the sole landmarks, a relic of the time when the 

 ancient marches were ridden in state : — 



