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CHAP. 30. (25.)—NINE VARIETIES OF THE CHERRY.

The cherry did not exist in Italy before the period of the victory gained over Mithridates by L. Lucullus, in the year of the City 680. He was the first to introduce this tree from Pontus, and now, in the course of one hundred and twenty years, it has travelled beyond the Ocean, and arrived in Bri- tannia even. The cherry, as we have already stated,1 in spite of every care, it has been found impossible to rear in Egypt. Of this fruit, that known as the "Apronian2 is the reddest variety, the Lutatian3 being the blackest, and the Cæcilian4 perfectly round. The Junian5 cherry has an agreeable flavour, but only, so to say, when eaten beneath the tree, as they are so remarkably delicate that they will not bear carrying. The highest rank, however, has been awarded to the duracinus6 variety, known in Campania as the "Plinian"7 cherry, and in Belgica to the Lusitanian8 cherry, as also to one that grows on the banks of the Rhenus. This last kind has a third colour, being a mixture9 of black, red, and green, and has always the appearance of being just on the turn to ripening. It is less than five years since the kind known as the "laurel- cherry" was introduced, of a bitter but not unpleasant flavour, the produce of a graft10 upon the laurel. The Macedonian cherry grows on a tree that is very small,11 and rarely exceeds three cubits in height; while the chamæcerasus12 is still smaller, being but a mere shrub. The cherry is one of the first trees to recompense the cultivator with its yearly growth; it loves cold localities and a site exposed to the north.13 The fruit are sometimes dried in the sun, and preserved, like olives, in casks.

1 He must allude to what he has stated in B. xii. c. 3, for he has nowhere said that the cherry will not grow in Egypt. It is said that the cherry is not to he found in Egypt at the present day.

2 The gnotte cherry of the French, the mazzard of the English.

3 A variety of the mazzard, Fée thinks.

4 Some take this for the Cerasus Juliana, the guignier of the French, our white heart; others, again, for the merisier, our morello

5 It is most generally thought that this is the Cerasus avium of bota- nists, our morello, which is a very tender cherry.

6 Or "hard berry," the Prunus bigarella of Linnæus, the red biga- roon.

7 Fée queries whether it may not have received its name of "Pliniaua" in compliment to our author, or one of his family.

8 Hardouin thinks that this Portuguese cherry is the griotte, or mazzard.

9 No such cherry is known at the present day.

10 Such a graft is impossible; the laurel-cherry must have had some other origin.

11 Fée suggests that this may be the early dwarf cherry.

12 Or "ground-cherry;" a dwarf variety, if, indeed, it was a cherry-tree at all, of which Fée expresses some doubt.

13 This explains, Fée says, why it will not grow in Egypt.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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