(Stutnce. 
They call for Dates and Quinces in the pastry. —Romeo andJuliet, iv. 4, 2. 
UINCE is also the name of one of the “ home- 
spun actors” in “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” 
and is no doubt there used as a ludicrous name. 
The name was anciently spelt “ coynes ”— 
“And many homely trees ther were 
That Peches, Coynes, and Apples here, 
Medlers, Plommes, Perys, Chesteyns, 
Cherys, of which many oon fayne is.” 
Romaunt of the Rose. 
The same name occurs in the old English vocabularies, as in a 
Nominale of the fifteenth century, “hsec cocianus, a coventre;” 
in an English vocabulary of the fourteenth century, “ Hoc 
coccinum, a quoyne; ” and in the treatise of Walter de Bibles- 
worth, in the thirteenth century— 
“ Issi troverez en ce verger 
Estang un sek Coigner (a Coyn-tre, Quince-tre).” 
And there is little doubt that “ Quince ” is a corruption of 
“coynes,” which again is a corruption, not difficult to trace, of 
Cydonia, one of the most ancient cities of Crete, where the 
Quince tree is indigenous, and whence it derived its name of 
Pyrus Cydonia, or simply Cydonia. If not indigenous else¬ 
where in the East, it was very soon cultivated, and especially 
in Palestine. It is not yet a settled point, and probably never 
248 
