The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare Part 107

In modern German the name _Walsch_ is used more especially for Italian."--WRIGHT'S _Celt, Roman, and Saxon_.[315:1] This will at once explain that Walnut simply means the foreign or non-English Nut.

It must have been a well-established and common tree in Shakespeare's time, for all the writers of his day speak of it as a high and large tree, and I should think it very likely that Walnut trees were even more extensively planted in his day than in our own. There are many n.o.ble specimens to be seen in different parts of England, especially in the chalk districts, for "it delights," says Evelyn, "in a dry, sound, rich land, especially if it incline to a feeding chalk or marl; and where it may be protected from the cold (though it affects cold rather than extreme heat), as in great pits, valleys, and highway sides; also in stony ground, if loamy, and on hills, especially chalky; likewise in cornfields." The grand specimens that may be seen in the sheltered villages lying under the chalk downs of Wiltshire and Berkshire bear witness to the truth of Evelyn's remarks. But the finest English specimens can bear no comparison with the size of the Walnut trees in warmer countries, and especially where they are indigenous. There they "sometimes attain prodigious size and great age. An Italian architect mentions having seen at St. Nicholas, in Lorraine, a single plank of the wood of the Walnut, 25ft. wide, upon which the Emperor Frederick III.

had given a sumptuous banquet. In the Baidar Valley, near Balaclava, in the Crimea, stands a Walnut tree at least 1000 years old. It yields annually from 80,000 to 100,000 Nuts, and belongs to five Tartar families, who share its produce equally."--_Gardener's Chronicle._

The economic uses of the Walnut are now chiefly confined to the timber, which is highly prized both for furniture and gun-stocks, and to the production of oil, which is not much used in Europe, but is highly valued in the East. "It dries much more slowly than any other distilled oil, and hence its great value, as it allows the artist as much time as he requires in order to blend his colours and finish his work. In conjunction with amber varnish it forms a vehicle which leaves nothing to be desired, and which doubtless was the vehicle of Van Eyck, and in many instances of the Venetian masters, and of Correggio."--_Arts of the Middle Ages_, preface. In mediaeval times a high medicinal value was attached to the fruit, for the celebrated antidote against poison which was so firmly believed in, and which was attributed to Mithridates, King of Pontus, was chiefly composed of Walnuts. "Two Nuttes (he is speaking of Walnuts) and two Figges, and twenty Rewe leaves, stamped together with a little salt, and eaten fasting, doth defende a man from poison and pestilence that day."--BULLEIN, _Governmente of Health_, 1558.

The Walnut holds an honoured place in heraldry. Two large Walnut trees overshadow the tomb of the poet Waller in Beaconsfield churchyard, and "these are connected with a curious piece of family history. The tree was chosen as the Waller crest after Agincourt, where the head of the family took the Duke of Orleans prisoner, and took afterwards as his crest the arms of Orleans hanging by a label in a Walnut tree with this motto for the device: _Haec fructus virtutis._"--_Gardener's Chronicle_, Aug., 1878.

Walnuts are still very popular, but not as poison antidotes; their popularity now rests on their use as pickles, their excellence as autumn and winter dessert fruits, and with pseudo-gipsies for the rich olive hue that the juice will give to the skin. These uses, together with the beauty in the landscape that is given by an old Walnut tree, will always secure for it a place among English trees; yet there can be little doubt that the Walnut is a bad neighbour to other crops, and for that reason its numbers in England have been much diminished. Phillips said there was a decided antipathy between Apples and Walnuts, and spoke of the Apple tree as--

"Uneasy, seated by funereal Yew Or Walnut (whose malignant touch impairs All generous fruits), or near the bitter dews Of Cherries."

And in this he was probably right, though the mischief caused to the Apple tree more probably arises from the dense shade thrown by the Walnut tree than by any malarious exhalation emitted from it.

FOOTNOTES:

[315:1] See Earle's "Philology of the English Tongue," p. 23.

WARDEN, _see_ PEARS.

WHEAT.

(1) _Iris._

Ceres, most bounteous lady, thy rich leas Of Wheat, Rye, Barley, Vetches, Oats, and Pease.

_Tempest_, act iv, sc. 1 (60).

(2) _Helena._

More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear, When Wheat is green, when Hawthorn-buds appear.

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, act i, sc. 1 (184).

(3) _Ba.s.sanio._

His reasons are as two grains of Wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them, they are not worth the search.

_Merchant of Venice_, act i, sc. 1 (114).

(4) _Hamlet._

As peace should still her Wheaten garland wear.

_Hamlet_, act v, sc. 2 (41).

(5) _Pompey._

To send measures of Wheat to Rome.

_Antony and Cleopatra_, act ii, sc. 6 (36).

(6) _Edgar._

This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet. . . . He mildews the white Wheat, and hurts the poor creatures of earth.

_King Lear_, act iii, sc. 4 (120).

(7) _Pandarus._

He that will have a cake out of the Wheat, must needs tarry the grinding.

_Troilus and Cressida_, act i, sc. 1 (15).

(8) _Davy._

And again, sir, shall we sow the headland with Wheat?

_Shallow._

With red Wheat, Davy.

_2nd Henry IV_, act v, sc. 1 (15).

(9) _Theseus._

Your Wheaten wreathe Was then nor threashed nor blasted.

_Two n.o.ble Kinsmen_, act i, sc. 1 (68).

I might perhaps content myself with marking these pa.s.sages only, and dismiss Shakespeare's Wheat without further comment, for the Wheat of his day was identical with our own; but there are a few points in connection with English Wheat which may be interesting. Wheat is not an English plant, nor is it a European plant; its original home is in Northern Asia, whence it has spread into all civilized countries.[318:1]

For the cultivation of Wheat is one of the first signs of civilized life; it marks the end of nomadic life, and implies more or less a settled habitation. When it reached England, and to what country we are indebted for it, we do not know; but we know that while we are indebted to the Romans for so many of our useful trees, and fruits, and vegetables, we are not indebted to them for the introduction of Wheat.

This we might be almost sure of from the very name, which has no connection with the Latin names, _tritic.u.m_ or _frumentum_, but is a pure old English word, signifying originally _white_, and so distinguishing it as the white grain in opposition to the darker grains of Oats and Rye. But besides the etymological evidence, we have good historical evidence that Caesar found Wheat growing in England when he first landed on the sh.o.r.es of Kent. He daily victualled his camp with British Wheat ("frumentum ex agris quotidie in castra conferebat"); and it was while his soldiers were reaping the Wheat in the Kentish fields that they were surrounded and successfully attacked by the British. He tells us, however, that the cultivation of Wheat was chiefly confined to Kent, and was not much known inland: "interiores plerique frumenta non serunt, sed lacte et carne vivunt."--_De Bello Gallico_, v, 14. Roman Wheat has frequently been found in graves, and strange stories have been told of the plants that have been raised from these old seeds; but a more scientific inquiry has proved that there have been mistakes or deceits, more or less intentional, for "Wheat is said to keep for seven years at the longest. The statements as to mummy Wheat are wholly devoid of authenticity, as are those of the Raspberry seeds taken from a Roman tomb."--HOOKER, "Botany" in _Science Primers_. The oft-repeated stories about the vitality of mummy Wheat were effectually disposed of when it was discovered that much of the so-called Wheat was South American Maize.