see it clearly
Spindle Tree
It is probably only owing to its comparative rarity that the Spindle-tree (Euonymus europaeus) is not more appreciated for its beauties than it is. It is generally but little more than a shrub, seldom exceeding ten or twelve feet in height when in a wild state.
The genus Euonymus derives its flattering name, which dates from the time of Theophrastus, and signifies "well-named," from its bad rather than its good qualities. As the Irish peasant to-day euphemistically speaks of the fairies as "the good people" because he is afraid of them, so the ancient Greeks called their avenging deities, or Furies, the Eumenides, or "kind folk," and their mother Euonyme, "her whose name is good." From the fetid smell emitted by the whole plant when bruised, and from their poisonous though lovely fruits, the Spindle-trees have apparently been given the name of this once dreaded being. Their chief distinctive structural characters are their leaves in opposite pairs and evergreen, or nearly so, though their stipules fall off early; the relatively large fleshy disk within the calyx upon which petals, stamens, and ovary are alike inserted; and the angular or winged capsule, which, though dehiscent, is somewhat fleshy in texture.
The one British species (E. europaeus) is also a native of Western Siberia, North Africa, and the whole of Europe from Sweden and Scotland to the Caucasus. Its popular names in English, French, and German, "Spindle-tree," "Fusain" and "Spindelbaum," all alike refer to the use of its wood for spindles, which still prevails where hand-spinning survives as an industry. The old English names "Prick-wood" or "Prick-timber," which latter is used by Gerard, and the French "Bois-a-lardoire," allude to its employment for skewers or larding-pins, formerly called "pricks," whilst another French name, "Bonnet de Pretre," alludes to the resemblance of its four-plaited capsule to a priest's biretta. A good deal of confusion seems to have arisen in popular parlance between this species and the Cornel (Cornus sanguinea), both trees being of about the same size, having opposite leaves, hard, tough wood furnishing good charcoal and easily bored longitudinally, and acridly astringent properties in the leaves and bark. Both trees are consequently known as Prick-wood, as Gatteridge, Gaten, or Gaitre-tree, and as Dogwood. The word "gatr," our modern "gaiter," means apparently a cover, and has been supposed to refer to the capsule hanging when burst like a cover over the seed. In this case the name must belong to Euonymus, and has only been extended to Cornus by mistake. It may, however, signify a pipe, and allude to the use of shoots of either tree, three or four feet long, as stems for earthenware pipes, for which purpose they are readily bored and are employed both in Russia and Germany. The name Dogwood is derived from the use of the leaves either dried and powdered, or in a decoction, in the treatment of mange or to expel vermin. Turner, in his "Names of Herbes" (1548), speaking mainly of the two species of Cornus, C. mas and C. sanguinea, known as "male" and "female," because the former does not fruit for some years, also alludes apparently to the Spindle-tree as "an other tree" in the following passage:--
"Cornus is called in greke crania, in duch thierlinbaume, in frech Cormier or cormer, the male of thys kynde have I sene often in Germany, but never yet in Englande. It may be called in englishe longe chery tree. The female is pletuous in Englande & the buchers make prickes of it, some cal it Gadrise or dog tree, howe be it there is an other tree that they cal dogrise also."
The whole plant is remarkable for its smoothness, for even when the young green wood becomes gray from the development of cork beneath the epidermis, the bark retains an even surface. A point of some physiological interest occurs in connection with this formation of cork. A few woody plants, such as Mistletoe and the Pennsylvanian Maple (Acer pennsylvanicum), never form any cork at all, but retain their epidermis and their green color. Others, such as the Willows and the Pomaceae (i.e., Apples, Pears, &c.), form cork from the epidermis itself, and, like most trees, do so towards the end of the first summer in the life of the shoot. The majority of trees form their cork a little below the epidermis, so as to bury the green layers of the bark beneath its opaque tissue, whilst both epidermis and cork are subsequently split into longitudinal cracks, which may widen into the deep furrows so familiar in the bark on the trunks of Oaks, Elms, or Poplars. Anyone cutting a switch of Hazel, Holly, Privet, or, in fact, almost any wood, may notice the bright green layer beneath the dull-colored external cork. In some few plants, such as the Clematis, the Vine, and the Honey-suckle, cork originates yet deeper, viz., in the "bast," of inner layer of the bark, which, as a consequence, comes away in long strips; but in Euonymus, whilst it arises, as in the majority of trees, just below the epidermis, its formation takes place not on yearling shoots, but on those several years old, and until it is formed the branch remains green externally.
In April the four-sided shoots put forth their pairs of delicately glossy, egg-shaped leaves, of a rather deep shade of green, each leaf being shortly stalked, two or three inches long, with a finely toothed margin and a tapering point; and among these, about a month later, appear the sparse clusters of inconspicuous blossoms. These are not individually half an inch across, and are of a pale green color; but they are noticeable from the regularly "tetramerous," or fourfold, arrangement of their parts--four sepals, their margins overlapping, or "imbricate," four petals alternating with them, each of an oblong-acute outline, four stamens, and an ovary made up of four carpels.
It is not, however, till the year begins to wane that the Spindle-tree displays its real charm. The leaves often turn crimson in autumn; but the fleshy, four-lobed fruit is the most distinctive beauty of the tree. Of a rosy red, or more rarely a creamy white, it resembles a cross of coral or ivory, and on bursting discloses one of the most beautiful or most daring of Nature's color contrasts. This is produced by the "aril," or fleshy covering to each of the seeds, which, alike in the red fruited and the white varieties, is of a brilliant deep orange. This outgrowth from the "testa" or integument of the seed resembles in structure, color, and function the more partial and divided covering to the seed of the Nutmeg, which is known as mace; but in the case of the Spindle-tree the development of this outgrowth after the fertilization of the seed begins, not at the structural base of the seed, its "funicle" or stalk, but at the other end, at the "micropyle," or orifice at which the pollen-tube enters and the primary root leaves the seed; and therefore it is known technically as an "arillode," whilst the mace is an "arillus." The function of either structure is apparently to render the seeds more attractive to birds, and thus to ensure their dissemination.
A variety with broader and more glossy leaves and larger fruit, sometimes ranked as a distinct species under the name of E. latifolius, is well worthy of cultivation, not only in shrubberies, where it may be well associated with the white-fruited kind for autumn effects, but also as a standard on lawns; but unquestionably the most generally known species at the present day is the evergreen Japanese Spindle-tree (E. japonicus), introduced in 1804, which, with its more decidedly egg-shaped leaves with scalloped margins, luxuriates in the sea-breezes of our southern watering-places; and, with foliage often ornamentally variegated with white or yellow, sustains but little damage even in severe winters.
In spite of its comparative rarity, it is singular that the beautifully modeled and colored fruits of this tree should not have attracted more attention from our poets; but showing brightly, as they do, late into the year, they have suggested to the Laureate the serene wisdom and experience of age. In a short poem called "A Dedication," Lord Tennyson expressly refers to the fruit of the Spindle-tree in the following lines:--
"take this, and pray that he
Who wrote it, honouring your sweet faith in him,
May trust himself; and, spite of praise and seorn,
As one who feels the immeasurable world,
Attain the wise indifference of the wise;
And after Autumn past--if left to pass
His Autumn into seeming-leafless days--
Draw toward the long frost and longest night,
Wearing his wisdom lightly, like the fruit
Which in our winter woodland looks a flower."