of the flowers. THE LIME. suggested the name. It seems now the (Tilia Europea.) fashion to doubt whether the lime has any title to rank as a native of Britain ; and if we apply to it the test which Daines Barrington has laid down, by which to ascertain whether a tree is indigenous or not, we shall certainly be compelled to relinquish it. He states, that the trees indigenous to any country, grow in large and extended masses, and ripen their seeds kindly, which spontaneously spring up beneath them; and applying this test, positively rejects the lime, as well as the sweet chestnut, elm, and box. Yet sir J. E. Smith, as well as Ray, and many other writers, have stated the various places in which both the broad and small-leaved varieties have been found growing wild. It is particularly mentioned that, near Shawley, in the neighbourhood of Worcester, is a wood, five hundred acres in extent, reEXPLANATION OF Cut.-a, perfect flower. mote from any old dwelling or pubb, stamina. c, petal, stamen, pistil. d, transverse section of the capsule. e, seed. f, winged petiole lic road, in which the principal under growth is the T. E. microphylla. It “The stately lime, smooth, gentle, straight, and is undoubtedly a native of Germany, fair, Russia, and Sweden, which lie yet fur- tries, though shorter, are much warmer LINNEAN ARRANGEMENT. Polyandria Mono- than our own, and the lime there ripens gynia. its seeds every year, which it rarely does Calyx inferior, deeply divided into five equal in England. Evelyn considered the lime deciduous segments. Petals five, inversely egę: shaped, obtuse, spreading, with usually a small as a native tree, though he laments that, scale on the inner surface at the base. Filaments in his day, it was so little known and culnumerous, threadlike, attached to the receptacle. tivated. “We send commonly for this Germen, globular, hairy; style, thread-shaped and erect, nearly as long as tree into Flanders and Holland, which the stamens ; stigma with five ohtuse angles. Cap. indeed grows not so naturally wild with sule woolly, roundish, five celled, with one or two A large and handsome tree us, to our excessive cost, while our with smooth spreading branches. Leaves heart- woods do, in some places, spontaneously shaped at the base, smooth, serrated, acutely pointed. Flowers greenish white colour, in loose produce them; and though of a some panicled cymes ; flower stalks axillar, each united what smaller leaf, yet, altogether, is for half its length with an oblong pale smooth leaf- good, and apt to be civilized and made like bráctea. Blossoms in June and July. more florid : from thence I have received The lime, or linden, “the most beau- many of their berries, so as it is a shametiful, graceful, and fragrant of our native ful negligence that we are not better trees, was well known to the ancient provided with nurseries of a tree so Romans, and is found in most parts of choice and universally acceptable.” Nor Europe. Several different species of this is this energetic lamentation less approtree have been enumerated; but Mr. priate to the present day. Even now, it Loudon, one of the most recent and able is much less cultivated among us, than in authorities on the subject, is disposed to many parts of the continent; though its class them all as so many different varie- elegant form, and rich-spreading foliage, ties of the Tilia Europea, only differing combined with the numerous purposes in the size of the leaves. The botanical to which its products can be applied, name some have derived from the Greek seem to blend in it, the useful with the word ptilon, a feather; and others from agreeable. Pliny speaks of tilai, light bodies floating in the air: in “Lime trees for a thousand uses sought." either case, the buoyant floral bracteas, so peculiar to this tree, would seem to have And though the abundant and varied Anthers two lobed. seeds in each cell. a 2 B Grateful the incense of the lime-tree bower." KEATS. products of our woods and forests, máy mer's evening, the perfume they emit is have partly naturalized some of its pro- fragrant beyond expression, almost to an perties, we shall have reason to observe, overpowering degree. that it still deserves, and might with “ The lime, at dewy eve diffusing odours." truth receive the same epithet. In external appearance, however, it “ Clear was the song from Philomel's far bower; does and will always hold an unrivalled place in our ornamental plantations ; and now, as in the days of Evelyn, “it is of These blossoms spring in a cluster from all others the most proper and beautiful a large leaf-like bractea, of the same for walks, as producing an upright body, pale hue as their own, which contributes, smooth and even bark, ample leaf, sweet in no slight degree, to the peculiar effect blossom, the delight of bees, and a goodly of the summer appearance of the tree. shade at the distance of eighteen or These are rich in honey, and hence twenty feet. Besides its unparalleled during the season, the lime tree is beauty for walks, its other perfections thronged by myriads of bees, whose are, that it will grow in almost all buzzing murmurs, though low in the grounds; that it lasts long; that it soon scale of nature's melody, yet soothe, heals its scars ; that it affects upright- refresh, and cheer the wanderer's ear, ness ; that it stoutly resists a storm ; that as they blend in sweet harmony with it seldom becomes hollow.” And who the never-ceasing choir of praise, which will not assent to the truth of this spirited ascends from nature up to nature's eulogium of the enthusiastic biographer God. The honey obtained from the of our Sylva ? who that knows it does flowers of the lime is said to be the not love the linden tree ? Whether we finest in the world. The little town contemplate it overarching, with its mag- of Kowno, in Lithuania, is surrounded nificent and refreshing foliage, the lofty by forests of lime trees, and is famous vista of the long-drawn avenue ; or for the honey exported thence, which see it, when standing singly on a fetches a price double that even of the lawn, where its luxuriant, pendulous, Narbonne honey. So valuable is it yet recurved branches, supporting a considered from its extreme purity and mass of glossy foliage, it forms a leafy delicacy, that it is solely used for medome, is it not pre-eminent in beauty > dicinal purposes, and in the manuIn spring time, though comparatively facture of some sorts of liqueurs, more late in leafing, how bright and lovely especially that called rosoglia. It is said the tinge of its young buds as they that the Jews of Poland obtain a someemerge from the russet robes in which what similar flavour, by bleaching the they have been closely folded, and common honey in the open air in frosty casting down their rosy tinged sheaths, weather. expand their delicate and tender leaves The fruit of the linden tree, when before the genial breath of April. In mixed with the flowers, produces a paste summer, like a verdant pavilion, it ex- not unlike that of cocoa. This was tends its grateful shade of “cool green discovered by Missa, a French phy. light;" within which all is tranquil and sician, but it was little valued by his refreshing to the languid frame and over- countrymen, who imported the real cocoa powered senses, being hung with a dra- extensively from their colonies. Fredpery fresh from nature's incomparable erick the Great, king of Prussia, feelloom, of verdant glossy green, wreathed ing a greater interest in the subject with the odorous masses of its thickly than the French could do, caused studded pale and sweet-scented flowers. further experiments to be made, which Even the ruthless gales of winter do but established the excellence of the paste display, more clearly, the elegant sym- produced ; but as it was found not to metry of its tall graceful trunk, regular keep well, the manufacture was reand tapering branches, smooth glossy linquished. twigs, and russet buds prepared for an- The wood of the lime tree being other season of expansion and beauty. peculiarly smooth, close grained, and The flowers of this tree are very of a delicate light colour, yet soft, easily abundant, and larger than those of most cut, very durable, and not liable to other timber trees. They are highly the attacks of insects, has been long odoriferous ; and in a fine calm sum- | appropriated to the purposes of carving. Smooth Linden best obeys. it in pieces from six to eight feet in The carver's chisel; best his curious work Displays, in all its nicest touches.” length, at the beginning of the sum DODSLEY. mer, when the sap is rising, and it is "One circumstance," observes Gilpin, easily divided from the tree. These are "should recommend the lime to all steeped in water till the fibres are sepalovers of the imitative arts. No wood rated, they are designated as bast, and is so easily formed under the carver's woven by the peasants into those coarse chisel. It is the wood which the in- mats, which are so generally used by gargenious Gibbons selected, after making deners, upholsterers, etc. Large quantrial of several kinds, as the most tities of them are annually brought into proper for that curious sculpture, which England, as wrappers to the bales of adorns some of the old houses of our hemp and flax which we import froin nobility." Evelyn claims to himself the Baltic, to the amount of many the honour of being the first who re- thousand hundredweights. The ropes commended this ingenious artist to and cordage also manufactured from king Charles 11. Some of the finest these fibres, are remarkably strong and specimens of this style of ornament are elastic, and are said to improve by exto be seen at Chatsworth, the princely posure to damp and wet, which swells residence of the duke of Devonshire, and unites the particles of which they though it is found in most of the noble are composed. They are still made in buildings or churches erected at that Cornwall and the west of England, and period. Horace Walpole observed of also in Lincolnshire, where the tree is Gibbons, that “he was the first artist commonly known by the name of bast. who gave to wood the loose and airy In Sweden, the fishermen construct lightness of flowers, and chained to their fishing nets of these fibres. gether the various productions of the To the Russian boor, the lime tree elements with a free disorder natural / is as valuable and useful as the birch to each species." to the Laplander or Swede, supplying The elegant and ornamental art of by its products almost all his few and carving has latterly fallen in disuse ; simple wants. Hence he procures timbut the qualities of the lime remain ber to build, or twigs to wattle his hut, unchanged, and now, as in the days tiles for its roof, the basket work of Evelyn, “architects make with it that forms his sledges from the outer models for their designed buildings.” | bark, and from the inner fibrous one, It is also used by carvers and gilders ropes and matting for various purposes, in their ornamented picture frames, The timber, too, furnishes the material and at iron foundries, the ornaments of all his domestic utensils, fishing boat, for the fronts of stoves, etc., are all etc., or is burned into excellent potash, first cut in lime wood. The wooden while beneath the shelter of the growblocks used by Holbein in wood en- ing trees he suspends his hives, and gravings, it is believed, were of lime. thus increases the value of their luIt is now principally used by the turner scious produce. But the principal and for various domestic articles; and being peculiar use made of the lime tree in peculiarly free from any tendency to Russia, and for the sake of which hunwarp, it is used by musical instrument dreds of young trees are annually sacrimakers for the keys and sounding ficed, is, that it is the sole material used boards of pianofortes. Though very in fabricating the sabots or wooden shoes fine in the grain, it does not blunt the of the peasantry. The bark tool ; and shoemakers and gloyers forms the sole, the fibres of the rind prefer it to any other wood for their platted, the upper leathers. Mr. Tooke, cutting boards. in his able work on the Russian empire, The inner fibres of the Linden bark strongly censures the impolicy of this are peculiarly strong, and well adapted custom, as costing in fact more than to be woven into matting, or twisted the value of leathern shoes, and tending into cordage. The former manufacture eventually to destroy the forests. From is chiefly confined to some parts of two to four young linden stems Russia and Scandinavia, where the lime required to every pair of shoes; and tree abounds in the forests. The trunk these rarely last longer than ten, and in being remarkably straight, and free the working season scarcely four days. from knots, the bark is stripped from In the whole year, therefore, at the outer are SO 66 lowest computation, a single peasant | they overcome the effluvia that otherwears out fifty pairs of shoes, to make wise would naturally result in the neighwhich one hundred and fifty young bourhood of much stagnant water. stems have been destroyed. The tree “ The berries,” says Evelyn, “reundoubtedly grows faster for cutting ; duced to powder, cure the dysentery, yet a fresh linden shoot is not fit for and stop bleeding at the nose. The peeling previous to being made up, distilled water is good against the epiunder at least three years. lepsy, apoplexy, vertigo, trembling of The smooth interior side of the outer the heart, and gravel.” Schroder combark, supplied the ancient Romans with mends a mucilage of the bark for tablets for writing on. Evelyn men- wounds. “I am told,” he adds, “that tions one, containing an unpublished the juice of the leaves fixes colours.” work of Cicero, preserved in the li- The lime tree will grow in any light brary at Vienna, which the emperor soil; but in a good, loamy, moist soil, had purchased from cardinal Maza- the rapidity of its growth is scarcely rine for 8000 ducats. Within a few credible. The finest specimen in Engyears, some ingenious experiments were land, is that at Moor Park, in Hertmade by M. Schäffer, to manufacture fordshire, of which Mr. Strutt gives a paper from various substances; that picture. It stands on a little eminence made from the bark of the lime was at the end of a stately row of lime trees, of a reddish brown colour, and which bound one side of the park, exsmooth as to be peculiarly adapted for tending more than three quarters of a drawing paper. mile. They are all lofty, and some The leaves of the lime, as well as of larger girth than this, but none equal those of many other trees, were used it in luxuriance of shade and redunby the Romans as winter fodder for dancy of branches, nineteen of which their cattle ; they are still collected for almost rivalling the parent stem, have, the same purpose in Sweden, Norway, at about nine feet from the ground, Carniola, Switzerland, etc., though Lin- struck out in horizontal lines to the neus says they communicate an un- | length of from sixty-seven to seventypleasant flavour to the milk. The one feet, and from six to eight feet garlands of flowers with which the in circumference, bearing again in their ancients were accustomed turn three or four upright limbs, like themselves at their convivial entertain- so many young trees, and reminding ments, were in general artfully bound the beholder of prosperous colonies, at together with strips of the linden rind. once supported by, and adding to the Thus Horace says, importance of their mother country. The age of this tree is not exactly but at this period it is in the The lime is well adapted for plant- most vigorous state of luxurious growth, ing in public walks and avenues in and has every promise of attaining a cities, as it bears clipping remarkably yet larger size. Its circumference at well, and is little injured either by smoke the ground is twenty-three feet, its or the violence of the winds. Those branches extend one hundred and twentyin St. James's Park are said to have two in diameter, and cover three hunbeen planted at the suggestion of Evelyn, dred and sixty feet in circumference. with a view to the improvement of It is nearly one hundred feet, and conthe air in the neighbourhood of the me- tains by actual measurement, eight huntropolis. It was about the same period dred and seventy-five feet of saleable adopted on the continent as a favourite timber. It must have been some such tree for avenues and walks, in pre-object,” adds the author, " that sugference to the horse chestnut, which had gested to the fervid imagination of been previously used for the purpose ; Milton his beautiful description of the and thus by the avenue before the cha- fig tree," or banyan of the Hindoos. teau we may often ascertain the date of its erection. In Holland, these planta Such as at this day (to Indians known In Malabar or Deccan,) spreads her arms tions by the sides of the canals are yet Branching so broad and long, that in the ground more abundant; and during the summer The bended twigs take root, and daughters grow months, the whole country is perfumed About the mother tree, a pillar'd shade, High, over arched, and echoing walks between. by their blossoms, which are beneficial, as to crown " Ribands from the linden tree Give a wreath no charms for me." known; a This peculiarity of growth, which not support the umbrageous and venerable improbably suggested the idea of pro- boughs; and that even the tree had been pagating plants by layers, is not un- much ampler, the ruins and distances of common to this tree. At Knowle, is the columns declare, which the rude another immense , lime tree, which, soldiers have greatly impaired.” Of twenty years ago, covered with its several of these inscriptions he gives us shade nearly a quarter of an acre of copies, which prove that it must have ground. The lower branches, which been “a goodly tree,” even in the year extended some distance from the trunk, 1530, the date of the earliest recorded. having rested their extremities on the He also mentions a linden tree, at ground, had taken root and sent up a Cleves, in the Low Countries, a little circle of young trees. These, in their without the entrance into the town, cut turn, had also rested on the soil, taken in eight faces, supported with pillars, and root and thrown up a second circle of containing a room in the middle.” 'The trees, at that time from twenty to Neustadt lime tree is yet standing; the thirty feet high. At Crompton, in girth of the trunk is now fifty-four feet, Warwickshire, is a magnificent tree and about one hundred in height. The between sixty and seventy feet in branches, which do not divide till fifteen height: the trunk measures fifteen feet feet from the ground, extend nearly one in girth at four feet fror the ground, hundred feet on each side of the trunk; and between nine and twelve feet di- they are supported by one hundred and vides into six upright branches. eight pillars, some of wood and others of Evelyn mentions a lime tree growing stone. The head of the tree has been at Depeham, in Norfolk, which, if the formed into a place for public entertainaccount be credible, must have far ex. ment, and is reached by a flight of steps. ceeded any we now can boast. “The Gooseberry trees are planted in the holcompass, in the least part of the body, lows, formed by decayed branches, and about two yards from the ground, is at the fruit is sold to visitors. least eight yards and a half; about the Some most interesting lime trees, root, near the earth, sixteen yards ; about now standing, are in Switzerland, and half a yard above that, near twelve yards are identified with the history of the in circuit; the height of the uppermost hard, yet successful struggle for indeboughs about thirty yards." pendence, which was maintained by He also describes “the linden of those hardy patriots against the Austrian Schalouse, in Switzerland, under which oppressors of their country. In the pubis a bower composed of its branches, lic square at Friburg is a lime, which capable of containing three hundred was planted on the day that the victory persons sitting at ease: it has a foun- gained in the defiles of Morgarten, over tain set about with many tables, formed the duke of Burgundy's army in 1476, only of the boughs, to which they as- was publicly announced : this uncostly cend by steps, all kept so very accurately, monument is a remarkable instance of and so very thick, that the sun never the poverty of the republic, and the simlooks into it. But this is nothing to that plicity of their ancient manners. The prodigious Tilia of Neustadt, in the duchy branches are now carefully propped, , of Wirtemberg, so famous for its mon- though the circumference of the tree strosity, that even the city itself received does not exceed fourteen feet. In the a denomination from it, being called by neighbouring village of Villers en Morig, the Germans, Neustadt under grossen is a yet more ancient tree, recorded as linden, or Neustadt by the great lime existing before the battle of Morat, and tree. The circumference of the trunk is supposed to be little short of one twenty-seven feet, four fingers ; the ex- thousand years. Yet it was, a few years tent of the boughs about four hundred ago, in good condition ; seventy feet high, and three feet: set about with divers and the girth of the trunk, at four feet columns and monuments of stone, I from the ground, thirty-six feet. The (eighty-two in number at present, and tree of Trons in the Grisons, beneath forinerly above one hundred more,) which the little band of patriots took the which several princes and noble persons oath to free their country from the yoke have adorned and celebrated with in- of their oppressors, is celebrated in all scriptions, arms, and devices, and which, their popular ballads as a linden tree, as so many pillars, serve likewise to though, in fact, it is a sycamore. This |
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