But in

trained upon poles, seldom more than three or four
feet in height; and "the pole-clipt vineyard" of
poetry is not the most inviting of real objects. In
Spain, poles for supporting vines are not used; but
cuttings are planted, which are not permitted to grow
very high, but gradually form thick and stout stocks.
In Switzerland, and in the German provinces, the
vineyards are as formal as those of France.
Italy is found the true vine of poetry," surrounding
the stone cottage with its girdle, flinging its pliant
and luxuriant branches over the rustic viranda, or
twining its long garland from tree to tree*." It
was the luxuriance and the beauty of her vines and
her olives that tempted the rude people of the North to
pour down upon her fertile fields:-

"The prostrate South to the destroyer yields
Her boasted titles and her golden fields;
With grim delight the brood of winter view
A brighter day, and heavens of azure hue,
Scent the new fragrance of the breathing rose,
And quaff the pendant vintage as it grows t."

In Greece, too, as well as Italy, the shoots of the vines are either trained upon trees, or supported, so as to display all their luxuriance, upon a series of props. This was the custom of the ancient vinegrowers; and their descendants have preserved it in all its picturesque originality. The vine-dressers of Persia train their vines to run up a wall, and curl over on the top. But the most luxurious cultivation of the vine in hot countries is where it covers the trellis-work which surrounds a well, inviting the owner and his family to gather beneath its shade. "The fruitful bough by a well" is of the highest antiquity.

*The Alpenstock, by C. J. Latrobe, 1829.
+ Gray's Alliance of Education and Government.
See the second Georgic of Virgil.

The vine lasts to a considerable age; it spreads also to a large extent, or, when supported, rises to a great height. Although it bears at three or four years plentifully, it is said that vineyards improve in quality till they are fifty years old*. Pliny mentions a vine which had attained the age of six hundred years. In France and Italy there are entire vineyards still in existence, and in full bearing, which were in the same condition at least three centuries ago, and have so continued ever since. The slender stems of ordinary vines, when they have attained a considerable age, are remarkably tough and compact; and the timber of the very old ones in foreign countries, which is occasionally of size enough for being sawn into planks, and being made into furniture and utensils, is almost indestructible. Strabo mentions an old vine which two men could not embrace. A single vine plant, which was trained against a row of houses at Northallerton, covered, in 1785, one hundred and thirty-seven square yards. It was then

about a hundred years old, and it increased in size afterwards; but it is now dead. In 1785, the principal stem of this vine was about fifteen inches in diameter.

Of the variety of the vine called the black Hamburgh there are several remarkable trees in England, covering a great extent of surface, and bearing (under glass) a profusion of the finest fruit. Of these, among the most celebrated are the Hampton Court vine, and the vine at Valentines, in Essex. The Hampton Court vine is in a grape-house on the north side of the palace: it covers a surface of twenty-two feet by seventy-two, or 1694 square feet. It is a most productive bearer, having seldow fewer than two thousand clusters upon it every season. In the year 1816, there were at least 2240, weighing each, on the *Miller.

average, a pound; so that the whole crop weighed a ton, and merely as an article of commerce, was worth upwards of £400. The Valentines vine ex

tends over a greater surface, and has a larger trunk, than that at Hampton Court; but it is not on the average of seasons so productive. It has, however, been known to produce two thousand bunches of a pound each.

CHAPTER III.

PULPY FRUITS, BORNE BY SHRUBS AND TREES, CONTINUED. MULBERRY; CURRANT; GOOSEBERRY; RASPBERRY; STRAWBERRY; BARBERRY; ELDER; BRAMBLE; CLOUD-BERRY; BILBERRY; GUALTHERIA SHALLON.

THE MULBERRY-Morus nigra.

THE mulberry-tree appears to have formed an object of cultivation at a very early period in the western parts of Asia, and in Europe. The attention there bestowed upon it must have been solely on account of its fruit; for the knowledge of the mode of rearing silk-worms was confined to the people of central and southern Asia till the sixth century. We read in the Psalms that the Almighty wrath destroyed the

* "

"mulberry-trees with frost;" and this must have been recorded as a remarkable instance of the divine displeasure, for the mulberry is universally known not to put forth its buds and leaves till the season is so far advanced that, in the ordinary course of events, there is no inclement weather to be apprehended. It has therefore been called the wisest of trees; and in heraldry it is adopted as "an hieroglyphic of wisdom, whose property is to speak and to do all things in opportune season In the history of the wars of David with the Philistines, the mulberrytree is mentioned as a familiar object. Pliny says of it, somewhat questionably, that "when it begins to bud, it despatches the business in one night, and that with so much force, that their breaking forth may be distinctly heard." Thunberg, an oriental traveller, tells us, which is still more extraordinary, that the sheath which encloses the flower of the talipot palm bursts with an explosion like the report of a cannon.

In this country there are many old mulberry-trees of large dimensions, and remarkable also for the quantity of fruit they bear. It is probable that some of these old trees were planted at the latter end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth centuries; for James I. endeavoured to render the cultivation of the tree general, in the same way that Henry IV. had laboured to introduce it in France. The first mulberry-trees of England are said to have been planted at Sion House, the seat of the Duke of Northumberland, in 1548; and the trees, though decayed in the trunk, still bear fruit. Mulberry gardens were common in the seventeenth century, in the neighbourhood of London; but either from the climate, or the prejudices of the people, the growth of silk never prospered. The mulberry is distinguished for the facility with which it may be Guillim's Display of Heraldry.