CHAP. II. 



BRITISH ISLANDS. 



21 



first existence; and thus, that the tendency even of nature, 

 independently of human art, is to equalise the productions of 

 similar climates. 



Caesar, in his Commentaries, states that he found the woods of 

 Britain to contain the same trees as those of Gaul, with the ex- 

 ception of the abies and the fagus : " Materia cujusque generis, 

 ut in Gallia est, prseter fagum et abietem." This passage has 

 given rise to much controversy, some authors supposing that 

 Caesar, by the word abietem, meant the wild or Scotch pine, 

 which is a native of Britain. As, however, the Romans de- 

 signated the silver fir abies, there can be little doubt that this 

 was the tree alluded to by Caasar; which not only does not grow 

 wild in England, but was not introduced into this country till 

 modern times. This solution of the passage is so simple, that 

 it is difficult to imagine how any mistake can have arisen, par- 

 ticularly as Pliny speaks of the Scotch pine expressly as Pinus 

 sylvestris {Nat. Hist., lib. xv. and xvi.) The only reason appears 

 to be, that the Scotch pine was formerly called the Scotch fir ; 

 and that the word abies, being considered to signify fir, was, 

 without further examination, supposed to apply to that tree. 



It is more difficult to reconcile Csesar's assertion that he did 

 not find the fagus in Britain, as that name is generally supposed 

 to have been apphed by the Romans to the common beech. 

 Belon informs us that, in his time {Les Obs., S^-c, en Grece, en 

 Asie, et aufres Pays Strangers, 1554), on Mount Athos and in 

 Macedonia, the beech was called phega. It is wonderful, there- 

 fore, says Ray, that Caesar should deny the beech to Britain : 

 his doing so can only be satisfactorily accounted for, by sup- 

 posing that by the word fagus he meant the Quercus ^'sculus, 

 the phagos of Theophrastus. Mr. Long, in his Observations 

 on certain Roman Roads, and Toltms, in the South of Britain, 

 p. 36., asserts that the tree Caesar called fagus was the sweet 

 chestnut, Pagus Castanea L. Mr. Long does not state his 

 grounds for this opinion ; but should the fagus of the Romans 

 be our chestnut, and their castanea our beech, it would not 

 only explain this difficulty, but do much to reconcile that 

 passage in the Georgics, lib. ii. v. 71., where the fruit of 

 the fagus appears preferred to that of the castanea. If we 

 consider that by fagus Caesar meant our common beech, all 

 that can be concluded from his remark is, that the beech was 

 not, in his time, discoverable in large masses in Kent ; where, 

 though it grows naturally, it is only found on the hills and not in 

 the plains. Mr. Whitaker, in his History of Manchester, con- 

 cludes that the Romans introduced the beech, partly fi'om the 

 assertion of C^sar above alluded to, and partly from the name 

 for the beech in the British language, foighe, faghe, faydh, 

 being obviously derived from fagus. The name in the Anglo- 



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