themselves on the memory as fields at all, were it not for the hedges
that mark them off. In Scotland hedges are not so universal, the
preference being given to stone dykes, where the necessary material lies
to hand, or, alas, to barbed wire, which, effective though it be as a
fence, prevails to vulgarise the fairest scenery. Dr. Walker states in
his _Essays of Natural History_ (1812) that Cromwell's soldiers first
planted, or taught the Scots to plant hedges in East Lothian and
Perthshire. They learnt the planting all right, but not, it would
appear, the subsequent management; for, except in the Lothians, it is
the exception to see hedges rightly tended. The plants are allowed to
straggle and to be browsed bare below by cattle, when the gaps are
repaired by running a wire through them. Far more admirable is the craft
of the English hedger, who knows how to make a beautiful and durable
fence by plashing and binding.
The timber of hawthorn possesses more merit than is usually assigned to
it; in fact, there cannot be said that there is any market for it,
owing, probably, to the rough state in which it is almost invariably
grown. But it is hard and heavy, with a fine grain, taking a good
polish. Some of the wood-cuts in back numbers of the _Gardeners'
Chronicle_ were engraved on hawthorn; but Mr. Elwes, who has
experimented practically with every British wood, considers that boxwood
is of superior texture.
In the good times of old, when men strove more earnestly to cut each
other's throats than, as at the present day, to catch each other's
votes, every Highland clan has a distinctive badge consisting of a sprig
of some common plant whereby friend might be known from foe. The small
sept of Ogilvie chose the hawthorn.
No tree or plant has lent its name more freely to denominate places. The
Norsemen are responsible for _Thorn-ey_ on the left bank of the tidal
Thames, to which the Saxons, forgetting that _ey_ is good Norse for
"island," extended the name pleonastically to Thorney Island, and then
came Edward the Confessor to obliterate both names by building on the
island the abbey and church--the West Minster.
Countless are the places called Thornton, Thornhill, Thornbury, etc., in
England, all named from the hawthorn--the thorn of thorns; while in
Scotland, besides romantic Hawthornden, and in Ireland, the Gaelic word
_sceach_ or _scitheog_ (_th_ silent) occurs in almost every parish in
some form or other--Skeog, Skeagh, Skate, Drumskeog, Tullynaskeagh, etc.
A foreign relative of the hawthorn may be mentioned here as being more
worthy of consideration as a timber tree, and, besides, being
exceedingly ornamental, namely, _Cotoneaster frigida_. Most people are
familiar with the genus _Cotoneaster_ in the form of shrubs of modest
stature, producing quantities of red berries; and in gardener's
dictionaries, etc., one reads that this Himalayan species grows about 10
feet high. If it did no more than that, it would be well worth planting
for the sake of its woolly cymes of white flowers in July and the
extraordinary profusion of scarlet berries which follows them; yet, even
so, it could not claim notice among forest trees. In fact, it promises
to outstrip the hawthorn in height. Some of mine have reached a height
of 40 feet already, at an age of fifty years, and if care is bestowed
on timely pruning in youth, the wood is straight, clean and very hard.
It has not yet been put to any economic use, so far as known to me, but
I have a notion it will prove fine material for the heads of golf
clubs.
The Rowan and its Relatives
There is no group of trees whereof the scientific nomenclature has
become so hopelessly confused as the _Pomaceæ_, a sub-order of the vast
rose order. The group itself divides itself naturally into seven
sub-groups or sections, which some botanists treat as independent
species; but British foresters need to concern themselves with only five
of these sections--namely (1) _Sorbus_, the rowan; (2) _Aria_, the
whitebeam; (3) _Hahnia_, the wild service tree; (4) _Pyrophorum_, the
pears; and (5) _Malus_, the apples.
Some people may feel impatient with these niceties of classification,
and declare that popular names serve all useful purpose; but many of
these trees are very beautiful, well deserving the attention of
planters, who are sure to be disappointed in being served with the wrong
species unless they are at the pains to know exactly what they order
from nurserymen, and are able to identify the plants when they get them.
The rowan tree (_Pyrus aucuparia_) is of humble stature, seldom
exceeding 40 feet; nevertheless, we should be losers if it disappeared
from our woodlands, not only because of its beauty and the delicious
diet which it affords to birds, but because of the peculiar veneration
with which, in primitive times, it became invested in Northern Europe.
The Norsemen held it to be a holy tree, consecrated to Thor, and their
faith in its protective virtues became deeply implanted in the folk-lore
of our own country.
Rowan-tree and red thread
Gar the witches come ill-speed.
It has been suggested that the singular expression, "Aroint, thee,
witch!" occurring nowhere in English literature except in _Macbeth_, Act
1, sc. 3, is a corruption of "A rountree, witch!" but the late Professor
Skeat sternly refused to entertain that explanation. Anyhow, so long as
belief in witchcraft endured in this country, a branch of rowan was
esteemed a sure protection against evil spells. In many a Scottish byre
a bunch of rowan may still be seen suspended, and a common feature in
cottage garden plots consists of a couple of rowan saplings planted
before the door, with their tops plaited together to form an arch, so
that comers and goers shall thereby derive protection against witchcraft
by passing under the tutelary boughs.
[Illustration: FLOWERS OF THE ROWAN (_Pyrus aucuparia_)]
In Strathspey it used to be the custom to cause all sheep and lambs to
pass through a hoop of rowan wood on the 1st of May, and flocks and
herds were driven to the summer shieling with a rod of the same wood. In
some parts of England the rowan is still called the "witchen." Evelyn
wrote of it under that name, and said that in his day (1620-1706) the
tree was reputed so sacred in Wales "as that there is not a churchyard
without one of them planted in it; so on a certain day in the year
everybody religiously wears a cross made of the wood."
By the by, let no lover of woodland ever speak of a mountain ash when he
means a rowan. That is a silly name, for the rowan has no affinity with
the ash, and although it may be found growing in the Highlands at a
height of more than 2,000 feet, yet it is just as much at home anywhere
between that altitude and the seaboard. We need not be ashamed of having
borrowed the name "rowan" from the Norsemen, for there is a strong
Scandinavian strain in our island blood. The Swedes spell it _ronn_, the
Norwegians _rogn_, and the Icelanders _reynir_.
The chief claim which the rowan has upon our affection is its autumnal
beauty. If the birds would only suffer its scarlet berries to hang a
little longer than is their wont, no British tree could match it in
brilliancy of fall. It is widely distributed over northern and central
Europe, and is established in Iceland, whither it was perhaps carried
long ago by pious Norsemen, for it does not occur in America. Little use
is now made of its timber, which is very hard, heavy, and tough; so much
so that in old days it was reckoned as only second to the yew for
bow-making. It is mentioned in the Act 8 Elizabeth c. x. as
"witch-hazel," among the woods whereof every bowyer dwelling in London
was to keep fifty bows ready in stock.
Among the place-names into which the Gaelic name for the
rowan--_caorunn_--enters may be mentioned Attachoirinn in Islay,
Barwhirran in Wigtownshire, and Leachd a' chaorruin in Corrour Forest.
The rowan cannot be confounded with any other species of this family,
nor with any of the numerous hybrids which have arisen therein, for it
is easily distinguished by its pinnate leaves, consisting of eleven to
fifteen leaflets set herring-bone fashion on a midrib about 6 inches
long. Except the true service (_Pyrus sorbus_) all the other species
carry entire leaves, lobed in some species, but never pinnate. The true
service tree, though believed not to be indigenous to Great Britain,
grows readily there, though it is not planted so often as it deserves to
be, both on account of its beautiful and useful timber and of the
excellent fruit which it bears profusely, qualities which cause it to be
very extensively cultivated in France. It is also a highly ornamental
tree, as those may testify who have visited Vevay in autumn and admired
the brightness of fruit and foliage in the avenues of service trees
planted there. I do not know of any specimens in Scotland, but there are
several fine service trees from 45 to 65 feet high in English parks;
none, however, remaining equal in stature to one at Melbury Court,
Dorsetshire, which has now departed, but was recorded by Loudon as being
82 feet high in 1830, with a girth of 9 feet 9 inches. The fruit varies
much in quality; the better flavoured kinds being highly esteemed by the
French peasantry. Evelyn says, "It is not unpleasant; of which, with
new wine and honey, they make a _conditum_ of admirable effect to
corroborate the stomach." Those who wish to plant this tree had best go
to a French nurseryman and order it under the name of _Cormier_ or
_Sorbus domestica_.
The wild service (_P. torminalis_) will attain a height of 70 or 80 feet
if it is given a fair chance, which it seldom gets from us. Its chief
recommendation is its handsome foliage, the leaves being deeply lobed.
They turn a fine orange colour in autumn, but the fruit adds nothing to
the display, being brown when ripe. For ornamental purposes the
whitebeam (_P. aria_) is far preferable to the wild service, owing to
the snowy whiteness of the young shoots and undersides of the leaves.
The fruit, moreover, is bright red; but this is of the less moment,
inasmuch as birds devour it so soon as it is ripe. By far the noblest of
all the _Sorbus_ group is the Himalayan _Pyrus vestita_ (also known as
_Sorbus nepalensis_). Its broadly oval, pointed leaves are very large,
thickly clothed with white wool when young, remaining white on the
undersides until late autumn, when they turn to a clear yellow. The
clusters of white flowers are very woolly, and are followed by large
round red fruits. It is an exceedingly handsome and stately tree, and
ought to be better known in this country than it is at present; but much
disappointment has been incurred through the vicious practice followed
by nurserymen of grafting it high upon the rowan, a tree of much
inferior bulk. The result is that the scion, flourishing vigorously for
a few seasons, outgrows the stock, which cannot carry up enough sap to
supply the wants of the more robust species. It is pathetic to see the
leaves endeavouring to unfold, but failing to do so. There is then
nothing for it but to root the whole affair up, and procure seedlings,
or, at least, plants grafted _low_ on the British stock, which, if
deeply planted, enable the scions to throw out roots of their own.
Leaving _Sorbus_--the rowans--let us glance at _Malus_--the apples; and
among the fourteen species, all more or less distinguished by the
loveliness of their blossom, confine our attention to the wild crab,
parent of all our cultivated varieties. Of all the floral displays of
British springtide, there is none more exquisite than an old crab in
full flower, standing in a sea of blue hyacinths. It says little for our
intelligence that, while we are ready to spend lavishly in the purchase
of foreign trees and shrubs, many of very doubtful merit, none of us
seem to think the crab-tree worth anything except as a stock for
grafting orchard apples on.
Nevertheless, the crab has valuable qualities besides its beauty. "Fetch
me a dozen crab-tree staves," shouts the porter of King Henry's palace,
"and strong ones. I'll scratch your heads!" (_K. Henry VIII._, Act v.
sc. 3). Those golfers who have passed their meridian surely remember
that crab was reckoned the only material for club-heads in the old days
of hard "gutties." But there was no great store of crab-trees in the
land; so when golfers began to become like the sand of the sea for
multitude the supply ran out, and club-masters carved the heads out of
beech. A tougher substitute has now been found in the American persimmon
(_Diospyros_), but methinks our native crab would hold its own with any
other wood if it were still to be had.
Probably the largest crab-tree in Scotland (if it still stands) is one
at Kelloe, in Berwickshire, which Sir R. Christison measured in 1876,
and found to be 50 feet high and 8 feet in girth.
The wild pear (_Pyrus communis_) is much more rare in Britain than the
crab-tree, being found only in the southern English counties, and even
there it is difficult to decide whether any pear tree is really wild or
only a relic of cultivation. The timber of the pear, whether wild or
cultivated, is very beautiful, and is one of the choicest for carved
work; whereof a fine example may be seen among the panels in Windsor
Castle.
The Gean Tree, or Wild Cherry
In discoursing about the hawthorn, I assigned to it the first place for
beauty of blossom among our native trees, but in holding that supremacy
it has a dangerous rival in the gean, or wild cherry, which, to quote
John Evelyn's eulogy, "will thrive into stately trees, beautified with
blossoms of a surprising whiteness, greatly relieving the sedulous bees
and attracting birds." In truth, the verdict upon the rivalry of the
hawthorn and the gean must be "honours easy," for if the fragrance of
the first turns the scale in its favour in spring, the gean scores
heavily in autumn through the gorgeous hues of its fading foliage, no
other British tree, if it be not the rowan, equalling it in sunset
splendour. Nor is the flower of the gean without a fragrance--more
delicate and less powerful than that of the hawthorn. Elwes tells how
the late Mr. Foljambe, of Osberton, when old and quite blind, used to
cause his son to lead him out among the cherry trees when they were in
blossom, that he might enjoy their scent.
Doubts have been expressed whether the gean tree can be claimed as truly
indigenous, many writers (my friend Canon Ellacombe among others)
accepting Pliny's statement (lib. xv. cap. 25) that the cherry was
unknown in Italy till Lucullus introduced it from Asia Minor after his
victory over Mithridates (B.C. 84), and that it was taken by the Romans
into Britain. In support of this view may be cited the absence of any
name for the cherry in old Gaelic, the modern word, _sirist_, being
merely an adaptation of the Latin _cerasus_, just as _an Siosalach_--the
Chisholm--is a rendering of the Norman name Cecil. The Scottish name
"gean" does not help us, being borrowed from the French _guigne_.
Nevertheless, Dr. Henry follows Bentham and Hooker in regarding the wild
cherry as undoubtedly indigenous in parts of Great Britain.
Lucullus, indeed--proverbial for his love of good things--may well have
brought to Italy some of the cultivated varieties of the cherry; but the
wild tree seems to have established itself as far north as Bergen in
Norway, in which province there exists a large wood purely of cherry
trees; and Wilkomm reported in 1887 having found semi-fossil remains of
the gean in Swedish peat mosses; wherefore let us give ourselves the
benefit of the doubt and claim this pretty tree as a native of British
soil. Anyhow, it is thoroughly at home in these islands, reproducing
itself readily both by seed and suckers, wherever it gets a chance; and
no tree should be made more welcome in our woodlands, both on account of
its beauty and utility.
Hitherto British foresters have treated the wild cherry with unmerited
neglect. Nobody thinks of planting geans, except here and there for
ornament; nor is there any regular market for the timber. Yet that is of
high quality and very ornamental for indoor work, having a fine silky
grain and a charming pinkish colour. Mr. Elwes, who has used it for
panelling, says that when soaked in lime water it assumes a richer tint,
resembling unstained mahogany. It has the merit of seasoning readily,
and never warping.
The pews in Gibside Church, Northumberland, were made of cherry wood in
1812, and are reported by Mr. A. C. Forbes to be perfectly sound and
well-fitting still. Wild cherry trees are seldom felled till they show
signs of decay, and as they are not long-lived--a century being about
the outside span of their vigorous life--the quality of the timber
should not be estimated from trees more than sixty or seventy years old.
The growth is rapid, and the tree may be drawn up in shelter to a great
height; there is a specimen in Windsor Park, near the Bishopsgate, which
was 93 feet high in 1904, with a girth of 9 feet 3 inches.
In the _Trees of Great Britain and Ireland_, Messrs. Elwes and Henry
have a plate representing an extraordinary cherry tree growing in
Savernake Forest, with a wild spread of branches and a bole, covered
with enormous burrs, measuring 12 feet 7 inches in girth at 4 feet from
the ground. A Scottish counterpart to the Savernake tree may be seen at
Gribton, near Dumfries, which, though only 56 feet high, has a girth of
12 feet 8 inches, with a branch spread of 70 feet. A massive gean tree
at Mauldslie Castle, Lanarkshire, was 52 feet high in 1899, with a girth
of 13 feet 2 inches. It is fast decaying, nor is the iron band with
which its fork has been braced likely to prolong its existence beyond
the natural term.
The wild cherry is the parent of all the cultivated varieties, many of
which are derived from a high antiquity. Pliny enumerates eight
varieties, including those with black and red fruits, and one which he
describes as appearing half-ripe, which seems to indicate what we know
as the bigarreau cherry. No doubt these varieties were of Asiatic
origin, the Chinese and Persians having long preceded European nations
in the craft of horticulture. The Rev. R. Walsh, writing in the
_Transactions of the Horticultural Society_, 1826, described "an
amber-coloured transparent cherry of a delicious flavour. It grows in
the woods in the interior of Asia Minor, particularly on the banks of
the Sakari--the ancient Sangarius. The trees attain gigantic size; they
are ascended by perpendicular ladders suspended from the lowest
branches. I measured the trunk of one; the circumference was 5 feet, and
the height where the first branches issued 40 feet; from the summit of
the highest branches was from 90 feet to 100 feet, and this immense tree
was loaded with fruit."
Compare with this the produce of a single cherry tree during the year
1913 at Faourg, near Avenche, in the Swiss canton of Vaud. It took three
men fifteen days to gather the fruit, which weighed in the aggregate
two tons. The fruit is of a small and red variety, used for making
kirsch; and it was reckoned that the crop of this tree would produce 200
litres of the spirit, which, at 5 francs a litre, amounts to £40.
The scientific name for the gean is _Prunus avium_--the birds' plum; but
what we mean when we speak of "bird cherry" is a very different, though
nearly kindred, species--_Prunus padus_, a pretty native tree of small
stature which is spread all over northern Europe and Asia. It is very
beautiful when covered with its white flowers in long racemes--pity they
last such a short time--but the little black fruits are of no use to any
creature bigger than a pheasant. Anglers in Norwegian rivers are
familiar with the white plumes of bird cherry, waving like fine
lace-work from the grim cliffs overhanging many a green _dal_.
Lovely as the gean tree is when in full blossom, some of the
double-flowering Japanese cherries are even more so, and they have this
advantage, that the display is not nearly so fleeting. What may be the
wild parent of these cultivated forms I am unable to say; but Mr. J. H.
Veitch, writing from Yokohama, indicates that some, at least, are not
cherries at all:
"The cherries in this neighbourhood are magnificent. Tinted
photographs give a very complete idea of their beauty; one looks up
and walks under a ceiling of the softest pink. At Mukojima a row of
these cherries a mile long by the river bank, in some places faced
by a row on the opposite side of the road, is a sight it will be
difficult to forget. Cherries are, in fact, to be seen everywhere
in and around Tokio, and it would be difficult to imagine anything
more beautiful for the few days they are in flower. The species
is known scientifically as _Prunus Mume_; it is really an
apricot."[13]
[Illustration: GEAN (_Prunus avium_)
IN BLOOM]
By far the finest display of these cherries that I have seen is in the
Arnold Arboretum, attached to Harvard University, Boston, U.S. There
Professor Sargent and Mr. E. H. Wilson have got together what are
probably the finest groups of these lovely trees outside Japan. The
profusion of blossom, snowy white or rich pink, must be seen to be
believed. Why is not more use made of them in the gardens of great
country houses in our own country? They are perfectly hardy, but, as
nurserymen usually supply them grafted on crab stocks, incessant
vigilance is required during the young stages to prevent the stock
reasserting itself and overcoming the scion.
Probably the reason why these exquisite forms of cherry and plum are not
more often seen is to be found in the perverse habit which impels most
people who have fine private pleasure grounds to spend the sweet o' the
year in London. Having been asked by the wife of a great landowner to
take counsel with their Scottish gardener about improving the pleasure
grounds round their magnificent castle, and perceiving that the climate
was peculiarly mild, the site facing the sea, yet sheltered, I suggested
that he should plant some of the fine Himalayan rhododendrons, as it was
just the place for them. His reply was resentful in tone. "The wur-r-rst
of rhododendrons is that they will not flower when the family's at
home." So tactless of the rhododendrons!
The Walnut
The very name we have given it forbids us to claim the walnut as a
native of the British Isles, for in Anglo-Saxon speech it was _wealh
knut_, the foreign nut, just as they called the Celts of the West
_wealas_, the foreigners, a name which has persisted to our times, as
Wales. So, also, mediæval German writers termed France _das Welsche
Land_, and, referring to the whole world, they described it as _in allen
Welschen und in Deutschen Reichen_, "in all Welsh and German realms." It
is not easy to fix the limits within which the walnut may be accounted
indigenous, so widely has it been cultivated for its fruit; but it is
certainly found as a wild tree over a great part of south-eastern
Europe, through Asia Minor, the Caucasus, Persia, the Himalayas to
Burmah, China, and possibly Japan.
More has been laid upon Roman shoulders in connection with their
occupation of Britain than perhaps they should justly bear, but we may
safely credit our conquerors with having introduced the walnut, which
they held in very high esteem as providing a favourite article of food,
and the nuts were easily carried and planted. The name they gave
it--_Juglans_, i.e. _Jovis glans_, "Jove's nut"--betokens the value at
which they rated this tree. Pliny devotes a long chapter to the walnut,
expressing doubt whether it was known in Italy during Cato's life (B.C.
234-149). He says that it was brought into Greece from Pontus (Asia
Minor), thence to Italy, wherefore the fruit was called Pontic or Greek
nuts. He also describes how these nuts were thrown at weddings,
certainly a more formidable kind of missile than rice and confetti, as
we now do use.
The walnut has adapted itself to the soil and climate of the British
Isles in exactly the same measure as the Spanish chestnut--that is, it
will thrive in all parts of the United Kingdom and grow to very large
dimensions under reasonable conditions of shelter; but it will not
produce fruit worth gathering in ordinary seasons north of the English
Midlands. Its merit as a timber tree entitles it to far more attention
from foresters than it now receives, for, indeed, it is one of the most
valuable hardwoods that can be planted. The fruit was too precious to
the Romans to allow the tree to be used for that purpose, but, wrote
Juvenal, _Annosam si forte nucem dejecerat Eurus--_"if the east wind
happened to uproot an aged walnut"--the timber was highly prized for
furniture.