CHAP. CXIII.

coni'fera:. pi'nus.

2229

resinous, and very light. It is used, in Italy and the south of France, incarpentry and joinery, and for gutters, pumps, and covering the sides ofships; and Olivier informs us that the Turks use it for masts. The kernel ofthe fruit has a taste which approaches to that of the hazel nut, and, inFrance and Italy, is much esteemed for the dessert. Sir George Stauntonmentions that the kernels of the stone pine are also much relished by theChinese. In Italy, they are put into several kinds of ragouts, and theyprove excellent in sugarplums, instead of almonds. In Provence, they areextensively consumed along with Corinth raisins, the dried currants of theshops. The kernels require to be kept in the cone till they are about tobe used, because they become speedily rancid when taken out and exposedto the air. In the cone, they will preserve their vitality, their freshness, andtheir taste, five or six years. They may also be preserved in salt; but in thiscase they lose great part of their flavour. In Pliny’s time they were pre-served in honey. They were formerly much used in medicine, but this isno longer the case. They are very eagerly sought after by squirrels, rats,and dormice. The squirrels which live in pine forests are chiefly nourishedby these kernels; and they contribute towards the dissemination of theseeds, by striking the cones against the rocks to make the scales open. Thecrossbill (Loxia curvirostra) is the principal bird that lives on the kernelsof the stone pine. To get out the kernel, the bird places the under part ofits bill under the scale, in order to raise it up, and then separates it with theupper part of its bill. The crossbill is a solitary gloomy bird, which ischiefly found in pine forests, where it makes its nest in the middle of Janu-ary, in the branches of the largest pines, fixing it there with the resin of thetrees, and coating it externally with the same material, in such a manner asto prevent it from being penetrated by either rain or snow. The kernels ofthe stone pine are occasionally brought to the dessert in England; for whichpurpose the cones are regularly imported by the fruiterers.

As a tree, the stone pine may be considered very ornamental where itgrows freely, or where it has grown up with an erect trunk, and attainedconsiderable age. Gilpin speaks highly in its favour; but we cannot helpthinking that he must either allude chiefly to what he has seen in prints orpictures, or to the pinaster, because we have never seen or heard of anystone pine in England of a sufficient size to justify his description : at allevents, it is obvious that his ideas were not clear as to these trees; becausehe speaks of the pinaster, the cluster pine, and the stone pine, as three dis-tinct kinds. From specimens and dimensions that have been sent to us fromdifferent parts of the country, we find that the pinaster is very frequentlysupposed to be the stone pine. Indeed, it may be considered as the stonepine of Britain; and, as Gilpin’s observations are almost as applicable to itas to the stone pine, and are, besides, beautiful in themselves, we shall givethem at length: —

“ After the cedar, the stone pine deserves our notice. It is not indigenousto our soil, but, like the cedar, it is in some degree naturalised; though inEngland it is rarely more than a puny half-formed resemblance of the Ita-lian pine. The soft clime of Italy alone gives birth to the true picturesquepine. There it always suggests ideas of broken porticos, Ionic pillars,triumphal arches, fragments of old temples, and a variety of classic ruins,which in Italian landscape it commonly adorns. The stone pine promiseslittle, in its infancy, in point of picturesque beauty: it does not, like most of thefir species, give an early indication of its future form. In its youth, it isdwarfish and round-headed, with a short stem, and has rather the shape ofa full-grown bush than of an increasing tree. As it grows older, it does notsoon deposit its formal shape. It is long a bush, though somewhat moreirregular, and with a longer stem ; but, as it attains maturity, its picturesqueform increases fast. Its lengthening stem assumes, commonly, an easy sweep.It seldom, indeed, deviates much from a straight line; but that gentle devia-tion is very graceful, and, above all other lines, difficult to imitate. If acci-

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