The Chestnut

Author: Top of the Rock Astronaut / Labels:

This fruit is said, by some, to have originally come from Sardis, in Lydia; and by others, from Castanea, a city of Thessaly, from which it takes its name. By the ancients it was much used as a food, and is still common in France and Italy, to which countries it is, by some, considered indigenous. In the southern part of the European continent, it is eaten both raw and roasted. The tree was introduced into Britain by the Romans; but it only flourishes in the warmer parts of the island, the fruit rarely arriving at maturity in Scotland. It attains a great age, as well as an immense size. As a food, it is the least oily and most farinaceous of all the nuts, and, therefore, the easiest of digestion. The tree called the horse chestnut is very different, although its fruit very much resembles that of the other. Its "nuts," though eaten by horses and some other animals, are unsuitable for human food.

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