Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume IX.djvu/720

 700 JUDAS TREE JTJDEA attached to the three or four species comprised in the genus. In America the genus is repre- sented by 0. Canadensia, which also bears the popular name of red-bud ; it is a small tree, rarely exceeding 30 ft., found from New York southward and westward, especially on the banks of rivers. When not crowded by other trees it forms a rounded head, and appears at a distance somewhat like an apple tree ; the leaves are round heart-shaped, of a bluish green above, with a grayish green on the under sur- face ; the foliage has a remarkably clean and healthy appearance, and is not liable to the attacks of insects. It belongs to the legumi- nosts, in a suborder in which the flowers are not perfectly papilionaceous; the flowers are of a dark peach-blossom color, and are pro- duced before the leaves appear in small umbel- like clusters, not only upon the wood of the previous year, but upon branches that are sev- eral years old, and even upon the trunk itself ; though individually small, the flowers are in Judas Tree (Cercis Canadensis). such profusion as to quite cover the tree, which when planted for ornament should be set against a background of evergreens, to show to the best advantage ; the fruit is a flattened pod with numerous seeds. The wood is hard and capable of receiving a fine polish. Upon the continent the flowers of the Europea^ species are used in salads, and fried in butter as fritters, and the flower buds are pickled in vinegar ; it is said that the French settlers in this country make a similar use of the flowers of our species, which have a pleasantly acid taste. This is one of the. native trees which have received too little attention from planters, as it is pleasing at all times, and highly orna- mental in early spring. The European Judas tree, G. siliquastrum, has less pointed leaves and darker flowers than ours, and is also less hardy. One of the most valuable hardy orna- mental shrubs of recent introduction is called in the nurseries C. Japonica, but is probably a variety of G. Chinensis, and is known as the Japan Judas tree. It is of slow growth, but blooms profusely when only a foot or two high, and has darker-colored flowers than the others. All the species grow from seeds. Jl'DD, Sylvester, an American author, born in Westhampton, Mass., July 23, 1813, died in Augusta, Me., Jan. 20, 1853. He graduated at Yale college in 1830, subsequently embraced the Unitarian creed, studied theology at Cam- bridge, and was ordained pastor of the East parish in Augusta, Me., in 1840. In 1843 he began the work on which his literary reputa- tion chiefly rests, " Margaret, a Tale of the Real and Ideal," &c. (12mo, Boston, 1845), which has been illustrated by a series of outline draw- ings by Darley (New York, 1856). In 1850 he published " Philo, an Evangeliad," a didac- tic poem in blank verse, and in the same year " Richard Edney," a romance. An old Indian tradition suggested to him a dramatic poem in five acts, "The White Hills, an American Tragedy." A volume entitled "The Church, in a Series of Discourses," was published post- humously in 1854; and his "Life," by Mrs. Arethusa Hall, appeared in the same year. JUDE (Gr. 'loMac), Saint, surnamed THAD- DEUS, or LEBBEDS, one of the apostles, a rela- tive of Jesus, probably a son of Alpheus and a brother of James the Less. No circumstances of his life are related. According to the tra- ditions of the West, he preached and suffered martyrdom in Persia. According to eastern traditions, he labored in Arabia, Syria, and Palestine, and died in Edessa; or, according to others, visited Assyria also, and died in Phffinicia. He is commemorated in the west- ern church on Oct. 8. The tradition of the church regarded him as the author of the Epistle of Jude, one of the canonical books of the New Testament ; but some recent critics believe the apostle Jude Thaddeus to be differ- ent from Jude the brother of the Lord and of James the Less, and the latter Jude to have been the author of the epistle. The genuine- ness of the epistle was disputed as early as the time of Jerome, chiefly because it cites the two apocryphal books of "Enoch" and the " Assumption of Moses." Most critics, how- ever, have maintained it. It is written with vehemence and fervor, seems to have been ad- dressed to converted Jews in Asia Minor and beyond the Euphrates, and contends against Gnostic, Nicolaitan, and other dangerous doc- trines. Commentaries on the epistle have been written by Scharling (1841), Rampf (1854), Gardiner (Boston, 1856), Huther (2d ed., 1859), Wiesinger (1862), and Schott (1863). JUDEA, or Judira, a name variously used in ancient geography to designate the whole of Palestine or the land of the Jews, especially during the period between the Babylonish cap- tivity and the last wars of the Jews ; the southern kingdom of the Hebrews, or that of Judah, in contradistinction to that of the ten tribes of Israel ; or the southern division of Palestine W. of the Jordan in the time of the