ACORN. GLANS,

THE OAK TREE.

QUERCUS.

In Botany, of the Monoccia Polyandria Class.

THE acorn, which is the fruit or nut of the oak tree, was the food of the ancient Britons, and particularly of the Druids, who, says the historian, lived in caves and hollow trees; their food was acorns and berries, and their drink, water. The name of Druid seems to be taken from the Greek word Spu's, an oak. They thought whatever grew on the oak was sent from heaven, and nothing was held so sacred by them as the mistletoe of an oak; and they believed it to be the favourite tree of the Deity.

Content with food, which nature freely bred,
On wildings and on strawberries they fed;
Cornels and bramble-berries gave the rest,
And falling acorns furnished out a feast.—Ovid.

Acorns were not the food of the Britons only. The inhabitants of Chios (in ancient times) held out a long siege, having no other food but acorns.

Acorns are eaten to this day in Spain, where they long remained a delicacy at the desserts. Cervantes often mentions them in his Don Quixote; but the Spanish acorns are certainly of a sweeter nature than those of England.

In times of scarcity and dearth of corn, they have been ground and baked into bread, both in this country and in France; but the taste of it is rough and disagreeable, and indeed acorns are said to be hard of digestion, and to cause headaches and flatulence.

The study of botany, and the encouragement given to agricultural and horticultural pursuits, have so wonderfully improved the state of this country, that what in early ages a king would have feasted on, the beggar now refuses; and the acorn is scarcely known as affording nourishment to the human species, even among the wandering vagrants who pitch their tattered tents, and cook their scanty fare beneath the branches of the trees that produce them.

Should there remain any persons so ignorantly obstinate, as to exclaim against the

study of botany as useless and uninteresting, let their plentiful desserts be furnished with a scanty supply of acorns, and their wine be exchanged for the beverage of their forefathers; and soon would they join in the praise of this science, and of all those who have given their time and talent to improve the health, and add to the luxuries of man, by this interesting and beneficial study, which, next to astonomy, carries our thoughts to heaven, and causes us to join the Psalmist in his exclamation, " O Lord, how wonderful are thy works, in wisdom hast thou made them all."

Before the Conquest, the wealds of Sussex (which is the largest valley in Europe) were one continued forest from Hampshire to Kent, principally of oak trees, that were only valued for the number of swine which the acorns maintained.

Acorns are but little used at present, except to fatten hogs and deer; they are sometimes given to poultry, and would be found an advantageous food for fowls, were they dried and ground into meal.

In medicine, a decoction of acorns is reputed good against dysenteries and colics. Pliny states, that acorns beaten to powder, and mixed with hog's lard and salt, heal

all hard swellings, and cancerous ulcers; and when reduced into a liniment, and applied, stay the bloody flux.

Every part of the oak is styptic, binding, and useful in all, kinds of fluxes and bleedings, either inwardly or outwardly; the bark is frequently used in gargarisms, for the relaxation of the uvula, and for sore mouths and throats. An extract made from the bark is said by some to be equal to the Peruvian bark.-Chambers.

The gall nuts of the oak, are of many kinds, but they have all the same medicinal virtue. I learn from Pliny that they were used by the Romans to colour their hair black.

John Ellis, Esq. discovered that acorns can be preserved in a state fit for vegetation for a whole year, by enveloping them in, bees wax other seeds may be conveyed from distant countries, by the same means.

The ancients thought, that of all trees, the oak was made first; and that among men, the Arcadians were born first; and that is the reason why they were compared to the oak.

It seems that in ancient times, the oak tree was not venerated by the Heathens only, as it appears there were oak trees in the

temple of the true God, for the Bible informs us that Joshua" wrote the commandments and the precepts of the Lord, in the book of the law, and that he took a very great stone, which he put under an oak, which was in the sanctuary of the Lord."

In the Valley of Mambre, which was in the beautiful country of the tribe of Judea, where Abraham was visited by the angels who announced to him the birth of Isaac, stood an oak, that became celebrated as the tree under which Abraham often went to repose and refresh himself. Bayle says, that this oak was said to have existed under the emperor Constantius.

It was an oak that caused the death of the son of David in the battle of the wood

of Ephraïm : "And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was taken up between the heaven and the earth: and the mule that was under him went away."

A periwig-maker in the town of Lewes, in Sussex, made use of this story to recommend the sale of false hair. He had a sign painted on the front of his shop, representing the rebellious son of David hanging in