98 THE YOUNG 



being found sparingly in the High- 

 lands of Scotland, but it never 

 forms a distinct feature in the land- 

 scape. 



The birch proper, B. alba, has been 

 by some botanists split up into three 

 varieties ; depending on such minute 

 characters, as the curvature of the 

 scales of the catkins, and the less or 

 more hairiness of the young twigs and 

 leaves, but these are so ill-defined as 

 to be irrecognisable, except by experts, 

 so that for our present purpose we may 

 speak of the birch as one species only. 

 Lowland readers will be most familiar 

 with the variety pendula, the weeping 

 birch, which is most commonly planted 

 as a specimen tree in parks or orna- 

 mental woods, where it often attains a 

 height of 60 to 80 feet, with a diame- 

 ter of 18 inches, and slender pendu- 

 lous branches 30 to 40 feet in length. 

 Its silvery white bark makes it con- 

 spicuous from afar, and readily dis- 

 tinguishes it from every other native 

 tree. But stately and beautiful as 

 these isolated examples are, to fully 

 appreciate the birch, one must ramble 

 in its indigenous forests, where it ex- 

 clusively covers large tracts of country 

 in the mountainous regions of Scot- 

 land, where it is now the aboriginal 

 tree, being far more widely distributed 

 and more truly spontaneous than even 

 the Scotch fir. Ascending the moun- 

 tain's side, it is the last tree to leave 

 us on our upward path, creeping up 



NATURALIST. 



the glens, and corries, to a height of 



nearly 3,000 feet, leaving behind even 



the hardy heather and the stunted 



pine: and where the timorous deer 



finds a sanctuary 



" Beneath the spreading birch, 

 In the dell without a name," 



and the grouse crops a scanty meal 

 from its leaf-buds and catkins. 



In the earlier epochs of ruder civili- 

 sation in our islands, the birch was of 

 far more economic importance to our 

 forefathers than it is now. Its wood is 

 white and soft, and although durable, 

 it is now almost discarded, except for 

 clogs and fuel. The uses of birch in 

 the time of Turner, the father of British 

 Botany, who wrote about 1550, may 

 be interesting as a sample of the style 

 of scientific lore at that period : " I 

 have not red of any vertue yt it hath 

 in physik: Howe be it serveth for 

 many good uses, and for none better 

 than for betynge of stubborne boyes, 

 that either lye or will not learne. Mech- 

 ers make prykke shaftes of byrche, 

 because it is hevier then eshe is. Byr- 

 ders take bowes of this tre and lyme 

 the twygges and go a bat folynge with 

 them. Fyssheres in Northumberlande 

 pyll of the uttermoste barke, and put 

 it in the clyft of a styke and set it in 

 fyre, and hold it at the water syde and 

 make fyshe come thytehr, which if they 

 se, they stryke with their leysters or 

 sammon speres. Other use of the 

 byrche tree knowe I none." 



