The natives of Central Asia, even in their most sanguinary wars, have refrained from injuring the fruit trees. Deuteronomy xx. 19, 20, forbade the Israelites to cut down any fruit tree in their sieges. When the Khalif Abubakr sent his general Abu Sufian to invade Syria, his instructions were not to cut down any palm trees or burn any fields of corn, to spare all fruit trees, and to slay no cattle but such as were required for the use of his army. And at the present day the Afghans in their constant inter-tribal fights have never injured the mulberry trees, on the fruit of which they so largely subsist.
Nothing irritates Burmese people more than to cut down fruit trees clanted by their ancestors ; these are the only t iiugs they possess in the shape of family heirlooms, which descend from father to son, and from mother to daughter. Women weep over this kind of destruction. A sacred tree of Burma, the thah-byay-bin, seems to be the jack-tree. In cholera times its leaves are kept in a pot or are scattered about the house.
In many British colonies, so prodigal has been the destruction of thnber that the authorities have been compelled to adopt measures of re striction. This has been the case notably in
Natal (where the depredations of the natives have been considerable), in Victoria and Western Australia, Queensland (where an annual licence fee has been imposed on wood-cutters), and in Ceylon. The climate of Jatnaica is said to have become drier of late years in that portion of the island where the greatest clearances have been made ; while in St. Helena, where young plan tations occupy old clearances, the island suffers less from' drought than immediately after the colonization of the island and the wholesale fellinc- of the trees.
The most ornamental flowering ;shrubs aro those belonging to the genera Rosa, Rhododendron, Azalea, Kalmia, Andromeda, Vaccinium, etc. Among the evergreen shrubs are the holly, the ivy, the jasmine, the box, various heaths, etc. Shrubs arc often planted together, forming what are called shrubberies, and when the kinds aro judiciously selected and arranged, these collections add greatly to the beauty of the gardens and pleasure-ground where they are introduced.—Fer gusm, Tree and Serpent Worship ; Itolleston ; Eng. Cyc. See Fruit ; Timber.