The younger branches contain a great quantity of pith, which, being very light, is made into balls for electrical experiments.

It has been said, that insects in general have so great a dislike to the Elder, that if turnips, cabbages, fruit-trees, or corn, be whipped with branches of it, or if a gate stuck full of them be drawn over the crops, no insects will attack them; and that an infusion of the leaves is useful to sprinkle over such beds as the gardener may wish to preserve from small caterpillars. It is thought even to be sufficiently powerful to drive away the mole, if laid in his subterranean domains; yet the Elder has its own aphis, and, according to Evelyn, a very troublesome one.

The flowers are considered poisonous to turkeys, and the berries to poultry in general; cattle mostly refuse the Elder, sheep are fond of it, and it is supposed healthful for them.

The wine made by housewives from the elder-berry is well known, and by many persons esteemed, though some think it nauseous; the juice is also used to colour raisin and other wines, and to give a flavour to vinegar. Elder-flower water is frequently used in this country as a cooling lotion for the skin. The Russians and the missionaries at the Cape use an infusion of these flowers as a sudorific in colds*.

"This tree," says Miller, "is as it were a whole magazine of physic to rustic practitioners; nor is it quite neglected by more regular ones." Evelyn says, if the medicinal properties of the Elder, "leaves, bark and berries, were thoroughly known, I cannot tell what our countryman could ail, for which he might not fetch a

* Latrobe's South Africa, p. 388.

remedy from every hedge, either for sickness or wound. Yet," continues he, "I do not by any means commend the scent of it, which is noxious to the air; and therefore, though I do not undertake that all things that sweeten the air are salubrious, nor all ill savours pernicious, yet, as not for its beauty, so neither for its smell, would I plant Elder near my habitation; since we learn from Biesius, that a certain house in Spain, being seated among many Elder-trees, diseased and killed almost all the inhabitants; which, when at last they were grubbed up, became a very wholesome and healthy place."

The scent is said to occasion violent head-aches to those who remain long near them.

There is a variety of the Elder, with white berries, and another of which the ripe berries are red; of this last the leaves are eaten by the red-deer, and the berries by partridges, moor-game, &c. It is a native of Germany, Switzerland, Italy, and Siberia, and was cultivated here by Gerarde in 1596.

The Canadian Elder, Sambucus Canadensis, is smaller than the common species; the berries also are smaller, and less juicy. This flowers from June to August; it was cultivated here by Miller in 1768.

According to Mr. Hall, the Elder is called by the lower orders in Scotland the Arn-tree: "It is a fact," says he," that from the bark of the Elder, or Arn-tree, as the common people call it, the juice of ragweed, and a few other productions of the country, the women in the interior, even at this day, as has been done in all ages, produce in their tartans, &c. as various and vivid colours as the dyers in England can do with their foreign drugs."

Sannazaro celebrates the scent of the Elder-flowers; he speaks of the eve preceding the festival of Pales:

"Non ostante che i fronzuti Sambuchi, coverti di fiori odoriferi l'ampia strada quasi tutta occupassero, il lume della luna era si chiaro, che non altrimenti che se giorno stato fosse ne mostrava il camino."

Arcadia.

Notwithstanding the branching Elders, covered with odoriferous flowers, spread their shade over the whole way, the light of the moon was so clear, that we saw our road as though it had been day.

The Elder is sometimes coupled with the cypress, and other trees considered as emblematical of death or

sorrow:

"The water-nymphs, that wont with her to sing and dance,
And for her girlond olive-branches bear,

Now baleful boughs of cypress done advance:
The muses that were wont green bays to wear,

Now bringen bitter elder branches sere :

The fatal sisters eke repent

Her vital thread so soon was spent.
O heavy herse!

Mourn now, my muse, now mourn with heavy cheer:
O careful verse!"

SPENSER.

The musical pipe called by the Italians Sampogna was formerly made of Elder-wood; and it is supposed that the name is corrupted from Sambuco.

The Elder-tree is very common in the hedge-rows, and by brook-sides, even in the neighbourhood of London, adorning and enlivening them with their beautiful white blossom. Happily for the housewives who make wine of the berries, the temptation to gather, offered by the beauty of the flowers, is counteracted by their unpleasant odour; and they are left to perfect their fruit.

The elder there

Its purple berries o'er the water bent,

Heavily hanging."

SOUTHEY.

The ripe berries are sometimes plucked and eaten by children, but they have a sickly flavour, which pretty generally ensures their safety.

That most imaginative of all personages, tradition, reports that Judas hung himself upon an Elder-tree*.

* See Every Man out of his Humour.-Ben Jonson's Works, vol. ii. p. 148.

ULMACEÆ.

ELM TREE.

ULMUS.

PENTANDRIA DIGYNIA.

French, orme; Italian, ulmo, olmo.

THE Common Elm, Ulmus campestris, is a native of. Europe and Barbary; it is generally supposed to be indigenous of England, though Evelyn and some others doubt whether this really be the case; all agree, however, that if not a native, it has been naturalized here even from the time of the Saxons. Dr. Hunter is convinced that it is a native of this country: "of which," he says, "there can be no stronger proof, than that there are nearly forty places in this kingdom which have their names from it; most of which are mentioned in Domesday-book. Chaucer lived at New Elm, in Oxfordshire; Dryden at Nine Elms, near Lambeth: there is also Barn-Elms, &c."

The bark of the young trees, or of the younger branches of old trees, is smooth, and very tough, and may be stripped off from the wood to a great length without breaking. As the trees grow old and large, the bark of the body cleaves or rends apart, which makes the surface rough.

The blossoms, which are of a pale red colour, appear before the leaves, about the end of March, growing in clusters on the twigs: they are succeeded by flat seeds, of which the greater part fall away before, or immediately after, the leaves spring forth; but a few will hang on nearly all the summer. The leaves are dark green, about two inches broad, and three long; rough on

K