PART II.
EXOTIC TREES AND SHRUBS.
We have already given descriptions and illustrations of several exotic species in Part I., where it seemed more advantageous to the reader to include them with British species of the same genus; those now to be dealt with are in all cases members of genera not represented in our native Flora.
The Plane (_Platanus orientalis_).
In spite of the fact that the Plane is an exotic of comparatively recent introduction, it seems in a fair way of being associated in the future with London. It has taken with great kindness to London life, in spite of the drawbacks of smoke, fog, flagstones, and asphalt. Its leaves get thickly coated with soot, which also turns its light-grey bark to black; but as the upper surface of the leaves is smooth and firm, a shower of rain washes them clean, and the rigid outer layer of bark is thrown off by the expansion of the softer bark beneath. This is not thrown off all at once, but in large and small flakes, which leave a smooth yellow patch behind, temporarily free from soot contamination. A variety of trees has been tried for street-planting, but none has stood the trying conditions of London so well as the Plane, and therefore before many years the capital will be the city of Planes.
Two species are recognized--the Oriental Plane (_Platanus orientalis_) and the Western Plane (_P. occidentalis_); but it would probably be more accurate to regard them as geographical varieties of one species, the points in which they differ being small and not very important. Thus the leaves of the Oriental Plane are described as being so much more deeply lobed than those of the Western Plane that the former are botanically described as palmate; but the two forms of leaf may often be found on the same individual. The Western Plane, too, does not shed its bark in small flakes like the Oriental Plane, but in large sheets.
Planes normally rise to a height of something between seventy and ninety feet, and the trunk attains a circumference of from nine to twelve feet; but there is a record of a portly Plane whose waist measurement was forty feet! Many persons imagine because the leaves of the Plane resemble those of the Sycamore that the two are closely related; but this is not so, and a comparison of the flowers and fruit will show that they are not. The catkins of the Plane take the form of balls, in which male _or_ female flowers are pressed together; and the fruits, instead of being winged samaras, are the rough balls that so closely resemble an old-fashioned form of button, that the tree is known in some parts of the United States as the Button-wood. (It is also known there as Sycamore and Cotton-tree.)
The Plane is supposed to have got its name _Platanus_ from the Greek word _platus_ (broad), in double allusion to the broad leaves and the ample shadow which the tree throws. These leaves are five-lobed, and, as already indicated, those of the Oriental species are much more deeply cut. Further distinction is found in the colour of the petiole or leaf-stalk, which is green in _P. orientalis_, and purplish-red in _P. occidentalis_, and in the larger and smoother seed-buttons of the latter. Instead of the leaves being attached to the stem in pairs, as we saw in the Sycamore, those of the Plane are alternate--that is to say, leaf number two of a series will be halfway between one and three, but on the opposite side of the shoot.
The outline of the tree is not so regular as in most others, the leaves being gathered in heavy masses, with broad spaces between, rather than equally distributed over the head. This is, of course, due to the freedom with which the crooked arms are flung about. The pale-brown wood is fine-grained, tough, and hard, and is extensively used by pianoforte-makers, coach-builders, and cabinet-makers, but is not highly esteemed for other purposes to which timber is put in this country.
The Oriental Plane is popularly supposed to have been introduced to England from the Levant by Francis Bacon, but if Loudon's statement that it was "in British gardens before 1548" rests on good evidence, Bacon's claim is dismissed, for _he_ was not "introduced" until 1561. It was nearly a hundred years later (1640) that the Occidental Plane was first brought from Virginia by the younger Tradescant, and planted in that remarkable garden of his father's in South Lambeth Road. The form that has done so well in London, and of which many fine examples are to be seen in the parks and squares, is a variety of the Oriental Plane, with leaves less deeply divided than those of the type, and therefore more nearly approaching the Occidental Plane in this respect. It is distinguished by the name of the Maple-leaved Plane (_Platanus orientalis_, var. _acerifolia_). It is this variety we have chosen as the subject for our photograph.
The Walnut (_Juglans regia_).
In the Golden Age, when man lived happily on a handful of acorns, the gods fed upon walnuts, and so their name was _Jovis glans_--the nuts of Jupiter--since contracted into _Juglans_. Those who delight in obvious interpretations by appealing to the modern meanings of words similar in construction may be pardoned for supposing that Walnut-trees were formerly trained against walls; but, like many other obvious interpretations, this is wide of the mark. Some have gone back to the Anglo-Saxons for help, and though the result arrived at is in all probability the correct one, it is almost certain that the Anglo-Saxons knew nothing of the matter, and would scarcely trouble to give a name to something they had never seen. The Walnut is a native of the Himalayas, the Hindu Kuh, Persia, Lebanon, and Asia Minor to Greece. The learned Roman, Varro, who was born B.C. 116, and died B.C. 28, mentions it as existing in Italy in his day; and Pliny tells us it was brought thence from Persia. The date of its introduction to Britain is usually set down as about the middle of the sixteenth century, but it was probably at least a century earlier, for Gerarde, writing at the close of the sixteenth century, describes it as a tree commonly to be seen in orchards, and in fields near the highways, where a very new importation was not likely to be found. But to return to the name: there can be little doubt that it is a contraction of W[:a]lsh-nut (in modern spelling, Welsh-nut), meaning foreign. This is German, and while the modern sons of the Vaterland write it Wallnuss (occasionally W[:a]lshenuss), the Dutch form is Wallnoot. That this is the true derivation is made pretty certain by Gerarde, who calls it "Walnut, and of some Walsh-nut."
That the new importation was fully appreciated in Europe for its fruit may be judged by the extent to which its cultivation had spread in Evelyn's day, for he tells us the trees abounded in Burgundy, where they stood in the midst of goodly wheat-lands. He says: "In several places betwixt Hanau and Frankfort in Germany no young farmer is permitted to marry a wife till he bring proof that he hath planted and is a father of such a stated number of [Walnut] trees, and the law is inviolably observed to this day, for the extraordinary benefit the tree affords the inhabitants."
The Walnut is a handsome tree, growing to a height of forty to sixty feet, with a bole twenty feet or more in circumference, and a huge spreading head. The bark is of a cool grey colour, smooth when young, but as the tree matures deep longitudinal furrows form, and it becomes very rugged. The twisted branches take a direction more upward than horizontal, but in early summer they are almost completely hidden by the masses of large and handsome leaves of warm green colour and spicy aroma. I once rejoiced in the occupation of a garden that held two Walnut-trees, and though they had not attained to the fruiting age, their possession was a delight to me; but then I am one of those who enjoy their fragrance, which is unbearable to some persons. The large leaves are formed after the fashion of the Ash-leaf--broken up into a variable number of lance-shaped leaflets with scarcely perceptible teeth.
The flowering of the Walnut is much on the plan of the Oak and the Hazel, the sexes being in different flowers, but borne by one tree; the males forming a long drooping catkin of slender cylindrical form, the females being solitary, or a few grouped at the end of a shoot. Separated from the catkin, the males will each be seen to consist of a calyx of five greenish scales, enclosing a large number of stamens. The calyx of the female closely invests the ovary, which has two or three fleshy stigmas. The flowering takes place in early spring, before the leaf-buds have burst. The fruit is a plum-like drupe, only the enveloping green flesh becomes brown, and, splitting irregularly, discloses the "stone," which in this species takes the form of a hard but thin-shelled nut--the well-known Walnut, with its wrinkled kernel of crisp white flesh, from which a fine oil is obtained. The ripening of these nuts--which is accomplished by the beginning of October--can only be relied upon in the southern half of Britain, and even there the crop is often spoiled by late frosts in spring. Its chief value in Europe is as a fruit-tree, though the light but tough wood is much esteemed for the manufacture of furniture. Owing to its rapid growth, the grain is coarse, but the dark-brown colour is esteemed, especially as it is relieved by streaks and veins of lighter tints and black. It is easily worked, and bears a high polish. The wood of young trees is white, gradually deepening to brown as maturity is approached. All the juices of the tree, whether from wood, bark, leaves, or green fruit, are rich in the brown pigment to which the hue of the timber is due. The combined lightness and toughness of the wood led to its adoption as the favourite material for making the stocks of guns and rifles. It is said that so great was the demand for this purpose during the Peninsular War, that a single Walnut-tree realized [L]600 for its timber, and this created a boom that led to the cutting down of all our finest Walnut-trees. Some of these were doubtless the very trees referred to by Evelyn, who tells us the Walnut was extensively planted at Leatherhead in Surrey, also at Cassaulton (Carshalton) and Godstone in the same county, where the rambler may come across fine Walnut-trees to this day, and occasionally to young ones growing wild in hedgerows and wastes.
The old doggerel adage, "A dog and a wife and a walnut-tree, the more they are beaten the better they be," has reference to the manner of harvesting the ripe fruit. Evelyn says: "In Italy they arm the tops of long poles with nails and iron for the purpose [of loosening the fruit], and believe the beating improves the tree; which I no more believe than I do that discipline would reform a shrew." He expresses no opinion on the question of beating dogs.
Sweet Chestnut (_Castanea sativa_).
Until about the middle of the last century the Chestnut was generally regarded as a genuine native of these islands. It is true that botanists felt that so large and longevous a tree, if native, should be found in the natural forests of this country, or even forming pure forest. These things they did not find, but, on the other hand, they were shown beams in ancient buildings, including Westminster Abbey, which were believed to be Chestnut-wood, and this evidence seemed to point to the fact that Chestnut timber was grown much more plentifully in this country at the period when these old buildings were erected. Dr. Lindley, however, set the matter at rest by examination of the reputed Chestnut beams in the roof of Westminster Abbey, and proved that they were of Durmast Oak. A similar examination of the timbers of the old Louvre in Paris, which were also reputed to be Chestnut, gave a similar result. A comparison of sections across the grain of Oak and Chestnut allows of no possibility of mistake, and it is now known that whilst the wood of young Chestnuts is tough and durable, that from old trees is brittle and comparatively worthless, except for firewood, which is exactly the opposite of Oak-wood. It is now generally agreed that its real home is in Asia Minor and Greece, whence it was introduced to Italy in very remote times, and has since spread over most of temperate Europe, its seeds ripening and sowing themselves wherever the vine flourishes. We appear to be indebted to our friends the Romans for its introduction to Britain, who no doubt hoped to utilize the fruit for food, as at home--a hope that must have been disappointed, for its crops, even in the South of England, are very fitful, and the nuts quite small.
In suitable situations the Chestnut is of larger proportions and greater length of life even than the Oak. In the South of England it will attain a height of from sixty to eighty feet in fifty or sixty years, and if growing in deep porous loam, free from carbonate of lime, and sheltered from strong winds and frosts, it builds up an erect massive column. Hamerton has said of such a tree: "His expression is that of sturdy strength; his trunk and limbs are built, not like those of Apollo, but like the trunk and limbs of Hercules." Under less suitable conditions the undivided trunk is little more than ten feet long; then it divides off into several huge limbs, and so the general character of the tree is altered, and it presents much the appearance of having been pollarded. The branches have a horizontal and downward habit of growth, the extremities of the lowest ones often being but little above the earth. The fine elliptical leaves are nine or ten inches in length, of a rich green, that is enhanced by the polished surface, which "brings up" the colour. Their edges are cut into long pointed teeth. Towards autumn they pale to light yellow, and then deepen into gold on their way to the final brown of the fallen leaf, which, by the way, is a great enricher of the soil where the Chestnut is grown.
The flowers, though individually small and inconspicuous, are rather striking, from their association in cylindrical yellow catkins, about six inches long, which hang from the axils of the leaves. The upper part of this catkin consists of male flowers, each with a number of stamens enclosed in a perianth or calyx of five or six green leaves. The female flowers, on the lower part of the catkin, are two or three together, in a prickly four-lobed "cupule," or involucre, and consist each of a calyx closely investing a tapering ovary, whose summit bears from five to eight radiating stigmas, the number corresponding with the cells into which the ovary is divided. Each cell contains two seed-eggs, but as a rule only one in each flower develops. As development of the ovary and seeds progresses, the cupule also grows, and ultimately entirely surrounds the cluster with the hedgehog-like coat in which the nuts are contained when ripe. Then it splits open and discloses the two or three glossy brown nuts. The Chestnut is in flower from May to July, and the nuts drop in October. They form an important article of food in South Europe, where they are produced in abundance, and there can be little doubt that the importers of the tree to this country believed it would prove equally valuable here. Evelyn had this in mind when he recommended the nut as "a lusty and masculine food for rustics at all times, and of better nourishment for husbandmen than cole and rusty bacon." Well, there is plenty of Chestnut grown around Evelyn's estate at Wootton to-day, but it is chiefly as coppice, to provide hop-poles, and hoops for barrels, for which purpose the long straight shoots are split in two. Grown as coppice, the Chestnut also provides fine cover for pheasants and other game. The trees begin to bear when about twenty-five years old, and from thence on to the fiftieth or sixtieth year the timber is at its best, but later it develops the defect known as "ring shake," and becomes of little use. That is probably why one meets with so many hollow wrecks of what were once noble Chestnuts.
The young wood is covered with smooth brown bark, but later this becomes grey, and its surface splits into longitudinal fissures, which give a very distinctive character to the trunk. In older trees the fissures and the alternating ridges have a slight spiral twist, which gives the tree the appearance (shown in our third photo) of having been wrenched round by some mighty force. The average age of the Chestnut is about five hundred years, but there have been in this country many old trees that were much older, if any reliance could be placed in local tradition. There was--we fear there is little of it still remaining--the great Tortworth Chestnut in Lord Ducies' park at Tortworth Court. In 1820 it was found to have a girth of fifty-two feet. Evelyn refers to it in his "Sylva," and tells us that in the reign of King Stephen it already bore the title of the Great Chestnut of Tortworth.
The name Chestnut appears to be a modification of the old Latin name _Castanea_, through the French form _Chataigner_. The Latin is said to be derived from Kastanum, a town in Thessaly, but it is more likely that the presence of Chestnut-trees gave a name to the town, as has happened so many times in our own country with various trees, the Chestnut included.
Horse Chestnut (_Aesculus hippocastanum_).
Our placing the Chestnut and the Horse Chestnut into juxtaposition must not be understood as a recognition of any relationship that may be implied in their names, but rather the reverse--to accentuate the differences that exist between them, and which have led botanists to separate them widely in all systems of classification. Although the fruits are sufficiently similar to have suggested the name Chestnut being applied to this, with a qualifying prefix, they have been produced by flowers of entirely different character. Evelyn tells us that the word Horse was added because of its virtues in "curing horses broken-winded and other cattle of coughs," a statement for which he was no doubt indebted to Parkinson (1640), who says, "Horse Chestnuts are given in the East Country, and so through all Turkie, unto Horses to cure them of the cough, shortnesse of winde, and such other diseases;" but seeing that, in this country at least, horses refuse to touch them, there can be little doubt that the name was given to indicate their inferiority to the Sweet Chestnut, and by a process only too well known to the student of early botanical literature, the name was afterwards held to be proof of their medicinal value to horses.
The Horse Chestnut is a native of the mountain regions of Greece, Persia, and Northern India, and is believed to have been introduced to Britain about 1550. It is not a tree that will be found in the woodlands, or even by the wayside, except when it is behind a fence; yet it constantly greets the rambler who has left the suburban gardens behind him, and in the public parks--notably the magnificent avenue of Bushey Park--where by contrast it exhibits itself as the grandest of all flowering trees. Though the stout cylindrical bole is short, its erect trunk towers to a height of eighty or a hundred feet, supporting the massive pyramid, beautiful on account of its fine foliage and handsome flowers alike. The stout branches take an upward direction at first, then stretch outward and curve downwards, though in winter, when relieved of the weight of foliage, their extremities curl sharply upward, and the great buds in spring are almost erect.
These brown buds, with their numerous wraps and liberal coating of varnish, afford considerable interest to the suburban dweller in early spring. He watches their gradual swelling, and the polish that comes upon them through the daily melting of their varnish under the influence of sunshine. Then the outer scales fall flat, the upper parts show green and loose; there is a perceptible lengthening of the shoot, which leaves a space between those outer wraps and the folded leaves. Next the leaflets separate and assume a horizontal position as they expand. Then probably there comes a frost, and next morning the leaflets are all hanging down, almost blackened, flaccid and dejected-looking. A warm southerly rain, followed by sunshine, reinvigorates them, and we see that the lengthening of the shoot has actually brought the incipient flower-spike clear into view. By about the second week in May the pyramid is clothed with bold handsome foliage, against which the conical spikes of white blossoms, tinged with crimson and dotted with yellow, stand out conspicuously.
The leaves are almost circular, but broken up, finger-fashion, into seven toothed leaflets of different sizes, which appear to have started as ovals, but the necessity for not overcrowding their neighbours has necessitated the portion nearest the leaf-stalk taking a wedge shape. The large size of these leaves--as much as eighteen inches across--leads the non-botanical to regard the leaflets as being full leaves. On emerging from the bud the leaves are seen to be covered with down, but as they expand this is thrown off.
The flowers consist of a bell-shaped calyx with five lobes, supporting five separate petals, pure white in colour, but splashed and dotted with crimson and yellow towards the base of the upper ones, to indicate the way to the honey-glands. There are seven curved stamens, and in their midst a longer curved style proceeding from a roundish ovary with three cells. In each cell there are two seed-eggs, but as a rule only one egg in two of the cells develops into a "nut." The ovary develops into a large fleshy bur, with short stout spines, which splits into three valves when the dark-red glossy seeds are ripe. In the Sweet Chestnut the brown skin of the nut is the ovary, which had been overgrown by the prickly involucre; here the spiny green shell is the ovary, and the "nut" a seed. Though horses will not eat this bitter fruit, cattle, deer, and sheep are fond of it. Pounded in water, it becomes one of the numerous vegetable substitutes for soap. Under the name of Konker, or Conqueror, it affords a seasonal joy to the average boy, who first bombards the tree with sticks and stones to dislodge the fruit, and then threads the ruddy konkers on string and does battle with a chum similarly equipped, the one whose string is broken or pulled from his hand by the conflict of weapons being the vanquished. In some parts the game is led off by the recitation of the rhyme, "Oblionker! my fust konker."
The growth of the tree is very rapid, and consequently the timber is soft and of no value where durability is required. Still, its even grain and susceptibility to a high polish make it useful for indoor wood, such as cabinet-making and flooring. It is also used for making charcoal for the gunpowder mills. Although Salvator Rosa and other landscape painters have made such good use of the Sweet Chestnut pictorially, they have utterly neglected the Horse Chestnut; and Hamerton hints that the cause of this neglect is the artist's inability to represent its large flowers and leaves by the landscape painter's ordinary method of laying on masses of colour: this requires drawing. The tree begins to produce fruit about its twentieth year, and continues to do so nearly every year. Its age is estimated as about two hundred years. The bark, at first smooth, breaks into irregular scales and in old trees a twist may be developed, as illustrated by our photo of the bole.
The generic name _Aesculus_ (from Latin _esca_, food) has no real connection with the tree, the ancients having given it to some species of Oak with edible acorns (_vide_ Pliny), but by some unknown means it has become transferred to a tree whose fruit is far too bitter to be eaten by man.
The Red-flowered Horse Chestnut (_Aesculus carnea_) is a smaller and less vigorous tree. Its origin is unknown, but it is believed to be a garden hybrid that made its appearance about 1820.
The Bay Tree (_Laurus nobilis_).
The Bay is the true Laurel, of whose leaves and berries the wreaths were made in ancient days for poets and conquerors. Naturally it is more of a shrub than a tree, for though it often attains a height of sixty feet, it persists in sending up so many suckers that the tree-like character is lost. In cultivation, however, it is often grown on a single stem, as well as formed by cutting into arbours and arches. We call to mind a Cornish village, where a garden enclosure in its square (or "plestor," as Gilbert White would say) was surrounded by about a dozen Bays so grown. Bays grow abundantly in the gardens of South Cornwall, and we always connected their general cultivation with the pilchard fishery. Certainly, these trees in the plestor were very convenient in the autumn and winter, for the leaves are an essential ingredient in the proper composition of that seductive dish, marinated pilchards, to which they impart their peculiar aromatic flavour.
The Bay is a native of Southern Europe, whence it was introduced at some date prior to 1562. Prior says the name is the old Roman _bacca_ (a berry), altered "by the usual omission of 'c' between the two vowels," this plant having become the _bacca par excellence_, because its berries were articles of commerce.
The evergreen leaves are lance-shaped, without teeth, and arranged alternately on the branchlets. Not all the trees produce the berries, for the sexes are in distinct individuals, and all the white or yellowish four-parted flowers on one tree are stamen-bearing, whilst on another individual they all bear ovaries and no stamens. The berries, at first green, ultimately become of a dark purple hue. The flowers will be found in April or May; the ripe berries in October. The Bay is grown chiefly as a shrubbery ornament, and can only survive our winters out-of-doors in the South of England.
* * * * *
Laburnum (_Laburnum vulgare_).
Although the Laburnums of our parks and gardens have all come from seed, and themselves produce an abundance of it, we do not meet with wayside "escapes" as we might expect to do, having regard to the habit of the tree and the fact that it is comparatively indifferent respecting character of soil. Possibly a remark of Loudon's may explain this. He says that rabbits are exceedingly fond of the bark, and it may be that they destroy any young trees that are unprotected by palings or netting. The tree produces such a glorification of many an ordinary suburban road, when its flowering time comes round, that one would like to note its effect as a common object of the hillside and the woodland, against a background furnished by our more sober native trees.
The Laburnum is at home in the mountain forests of Central and Southern Europe, but there is no record of its introduction to Britain. We do know, however, that it has been with us for more than three centuries, for Gerarde, in his "Herbal," published 1597, refers to it as growing in his garden. It belongs to the great Pea and Bean family (_Leguminosae_), and is very closely related to the Common Broom, whose solitary flowers those of the Laburnum's drooping racemes nearly resemble. Ordinarily it is only a low tree of about twenty feet in height, but in favourable situations it may attain to thirty feet or more. Some of the larger Laburnums, however, are of a distinct species (_L. alpinus_).
The pale round branches are clothed with leaves that are divided into three oval-lance-shaped leaflets, covered on the underside with silvery down. Both leaves and golden flowers appear simultaneously in May, but from the fact that the latter are gathered into numerous long pendulous racemes, their blaze of colour makes the leaves almost invisible. Tennyson's description of its flowering--"Laburnum, dropping wells of fire"--is fine, but we rather prefer Cowper's "rich in streaming gold," as embodying a more exact colour idea. The flowers are succeeded by long downy legumes or pods, like those of the bean and pea, containing many seeds, which are of a dangerously violent emetic character when introduced to the human stomach. The dark wood is of coarse grain; but, in spite of this, hard and enduring, and taking a good polish. It is chiefly used by musical instrument makers, turners, and cabinet-makers.
Laburnum is the old Latin name, which is thus rather fancifully explained by Prior, "an adjective from _L. labor_, denoting what belongs to the _hour of labour_, and which may allude to its closing its leaflets together at night, and expanding them by day." Common local names are Golden Chain, suggested by the strings of flowers, and Bean-trefoile and Pea-tree, having reference to the leaves and legumes respectively.
The Locust Tree (_Robinia pseudacacia_).
Although the Locust, or False Acacia, is little planted now, it is only paying the penalty for having had its merits enormously exaggerated; just as human reputations sometimes sink into oblivion after a season of popularity achieved by the persistent "booming" of influential friends. The friend in this case was William Cobbett, who, on his return from the United States, about 1820, preached salvation to the timber grower through the planting of Robinia; "nothing in the timber way could be so great a benefit as the general cultivation of this tree." So great was the demand thus created that Cobbett himself started a nursery for the propagation and supply of Robinias, and so great is the virtue of a name that people refused the Locust-trees that every nurseryman had in stock and wished to sell, and would be content with nothing but Cobbett's Robinias, which could not be produced fast enough for the demand! They thought it was an entirely new introduction, though it had been grown in this country as an ornamental tree for nearly two centuries! Its wood is hard, strong, and durable, but liable to crack, and of limited utility.
The Locust was introduced to Europe from North America early in the seventeenth century, and was then thought to be identical with the African Acacia. Linnaeus named the genus in honour of Jean Robin, a French botanist, whose son, an official at the Jardin des Plantes, was the first to cultivate the tree in Europe.
It is a tree of light and graceful proportions, its branches being long and slender, and the long narrow leaves being broken up into a large number of small oval leaflets, arranged _pinnately_, that is, featherwise. The stipules, which are found at the base of the leaf-stalk in many plants, are in this genus converted into sharp spines. The flowers, of similar pea-shape to those of the Laburnum, are white and fragrant. They are in long loose racemes, which droop from the axils of the leaves in May. The legumes are very thin, and of a dark-brown hue.
This was one of the first American trees introduced to Europe, and its name of Locust came with it, the missionaries believing it must be the tree upon whose fruit, with the addition of wild honey, John the Baptist supported himself in the wilderness. It is also known as Silver Chain, in contradistinction to the Gold Chain or Laburnum; also as White Laburnum.
The Larch (_Larix europaea_).
An enormous number of exotic Coniferous trees are at the present time commonly grown in our parks and pleasure grounds, and even our woods show a considerable variety beyond the Scots Pine and Yew that Nature has alone given us as timber trees in this order. To attempt to give even a very brief account of all these in a pocket volume, in addition to almost the entire woody Flora indigenous to these islands, would be manifestly absurd. We can, however, deal with a few representative species of these exotics, and we give the Larch the first place by reason of its present plentifulness in extensive unmixed woods and plantations.
The Larch is naturally a tree of the mountains, and ascends to a greater elevation even than the Spruce Fir. Unmixed forests of Larch in the Bavarian Alps occur between 3000 and 6000 feet above sea-level, and on the central Swiss Alps it ascends to nearly 7000 feet. A long winter of real cold is necessary for its full development and the ripening of its wood, and for that reason the timber of Larch grown in England is inferior to that grown in its native countries, because our winters are either short or mild, and neither gives the tree the full rest it needs. It is a European tree, and was introduced--though not in any numbers--to England at some date prior to 1629. For 150 years it appears to have been cultivated here merely as an ornamental garden tree. Then attention was called to its value as a timber tree, and the Society of Arts offered gold medals for Larch planting and essays upon its economic importance. Already (1728) the second Duke of Atholl had begun those experiments in Larch growing for timber which have been continued by his successors on a vast scale, the fourth Duke planting 27,000,000 Larch-trees on 15,000 acres of barren land. Their example has been copied on a smaller scale all over the country.
The Larch is a lofty tree, with a very straight tapering trunk ordinarily attaining a length between 80 and 100 feet, but under very favourable conditions 120 feet, with a girth of bole from 6 to 12 feet. The brown bark is easily separable into thin layers, and the growth of the tree causes it to split into deep longitudinal fissures. The long lower branches are spreading, with a downward tendency, and the tips turned upward again. The twigs are mostly pendulous, and bear long and slender light-green leaves, in bundles of thirty or forty. All the other families of Coniferous trees are evergreen, their leaves lasting for several years; but at the beginning of winter the Larch leaves wither and fall, and the Larch-wood takes on a more lifeless aspect than is assumed by any of our native trees in their leafless condition. But in spring, when the fresh green leaves are just showing in spreading tufts, and the reddish-purple female flowers--Tennyson's "rosy plumelets"--hang brightly from the gaunt branches, the Larch wears an entirely different appearance, and in summer the light grace of branches and foliage makes the Larch a beautiful object. That is, one should say, the trees that grow on the very outer edge of the wood, or, better still, one that has been planted as a specimen tree, where it has room to fling out its arms on all sides without touching anything, and can get the abundant light it needs. The straight rows in the plantation, with every tree at an equal distance from its neighbours, and its lower branches dead, may be very pretty from the timber-merchant's point of view, but one likes to think of the tree as a living thing of beauty rather than as a detail in a factory where scaffold-poles and telegraph-posts are being grown to regulation size and shape.
The brown cones are egg-shaped, little more than an inch in length, the scales with loose edges. The wood is very durable, and it has the great recommendation of being fit for ordinary use when the tree is only forty years old. It is most valuable for those purposes where exposure to all weathers is a necessity, for it endures constant change from wet to dry. Larch-bark is used for tanning, and Venice turpentine is a product of the tree. Unlike most Conifers, it has the power of sending out new shoots when the branches have been removed close up to the stem.
Larch plantations sometimes present the appearance of death whilst they are still covered with foliage, but the leaves are yellow and twisted. This most frequently occurs in the case of trees between the ages of ten and fourteen years, and is due to the depredations of a leaf-mining caterpillar, which ultimately changes into a minute moth, the Larch-miner (_Coleophora laricella_). It feeds in the interior of the Larch-needles, and therefore is beyond the reach of destruction, except by felling and burning affected trees, to prevent the spread of the pest. Its ravages keep the tree in ill-health, and apparently prepare the way for the deadly attack of another small enemy, known as the Larch Canker--the fungus _Peziza willkommii_. Sickly trees are also liable to the attentions of a Wood-wasp (_Sirex juvencus_), whose appearance is usually the cause of a little terror in nervous persons. It has two pairs of smoky transparent wings, and its stout, straight, blue body terminates in a long slender point. Its large white grub spends two or three years tunnelling towards the heart of the tree and out to the bark again, but rarely attacks sound trees. It sometimes makes its appearance in a house from wood that has been used for building purposes.
The Silver Fir (_Abies pectinata_).
Evelyn has left on record the fact that a two-year-old specimen of the Silver Fir was planted in Harefield Park, near Uxbridge, in the year 1603, and this is usually regarded as the date of its introduction to England, though the evidence is by no means conclusive. Its home is in the mountain regions of Central and Southern Europe. Its highest range appears to be on the Pyrenees, where it is found at an elevation of 6500 feet, forming pure forests of considerable area. Specimens have been recorded in Southern Germany that have attained a height of nearly 200 feet, but in this country a more usual stature is from 100 to 120 feet, with a bole girth between 10 and 15 feet. Its trunk is straight and erect, tapering gently, and covered with smooth bark, of a greyish-brown colour, which in aged specimens becomes rugged and fissured longitudinally, as shown in our photo, and of a silvery grey colour. It retains its lower branches for a period of forty to fifty years, but after that age they begin to fall off. Whilst the tree is growing up--which is, roughly speaking, during its first two hundred years--the crown forms a slender bush; but its vertical growth completed, the crown grows laterally, and becomes flat-topped. Its life-period covers about four hundred years.
The leaves are flat and slender, not in bundles, as in the Scots Pine, but arranged along the branchlets in two or three dense ranks. They are dark, rich green above, about an inch long, and on the flattened underside there is a bluish-white stripe on each side of the midrib, which gives a silvery appearance to the foliage when upturned, as is usual on the fertile branches. These leaves endure from six to nine years. The flowers appear in May at the tips of the branches. The male flowers are about three-quarters of an inch long, and consist of two or three series of overlapping scales, enclosing the yellow stamens. The cones are cylindrical, with a blunt top, always erect, 6 to 8 inches long, and from 1-1/4 to 2 inches in diameter. On the back of each of the broad scales there is a long, slender, pointed bract, which extends beyond the scale and turns downward. At first these cones are green, then become reddish, and when mature are brown; but maturity is not reached until eighteen months after their appearance. The angular seeds are furnished with a broad wing twice their length. They are shed by the cones in the spring following their maturity, the scales falling at the same time and leaving the core of the cone on the tree.
As a rule, the tree does not produce fertile seeds until it is about forty years of age, but seedless cones are formed from its twentieth year. Although the flowers of both sexes are found on the same tree, it may be that for a series of years only cones are produced. Until the Silver Fir is about twelve years old its growth is slow, and its annual increase is only a few inches, but later it will be as many feet. During this early stage spring frosts often destroy the leader-shoot, but its place is taken by another shoot; and soon the symmetry of the tree is restored. If this occurs at a later stage, however, the tree bears evidence of it in a forked trunk. It is a deep-rooting species, with a branching tap-root, and succeeds best in an open soil that is moist without being wet.
The timber, which has an irregular grain, is strong, and does not warp; but it is soft, and not enduring where it is exposed to the weather. It is yellowish-white in colour, and is largely used for all interior work.
* * * * *
The Spruce Fir (_Picea excelsa_).
Although we are compelled to class the Spruce among introduced species, it can lay claim to have been one of the older forest trees of Britain, for the upper beds of the Tertiary formations contain abundant evidence that the Spruce was a native here when those strata were laid down. Of its modern introduction there is no record, but from mention of it by Turner in his "Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe, etc.," we know that it was at some date anterior to the publication of that work (1548). It is widely distributed as a native tree throughout the continent of Europe, with the exception of Denmark and Holland. It is the principal forest tree on the elevated tracts of Germany and Switzerland, and on the central Alpine ranges it reaches an altitude of 6500 feet. It is an extremely variable tree, but we cannot here deal with the varieties beyond saying that two principal forms, different in habit and in timber, are outwardly distinguished by one having red, the other green, cones.
The Spruce Fir is a tall and graceful tree with tapering trunk, 120 to 150 feet in height, though in this country its more usual stature, when full-grown, would be about 80 feet high, with a bole circumference of about 9 feet. At first covered with thin, smooth, warm-brown bark, in later life this breaks up into irregular scales, thin layers of which are cast off. Instead of a bushy crown, such as we see in the Silver Fir, the Spruce ends in a delicate spire, so familiar in the Christmas-tree, which is a Spruce Fir in the nursery stage. The branches are in very regular tiers from base to summit, and the branchlets go off almost opposite each other, densely clothed with the short grass-green needles. These are from a half to three-quarters of an inch in length, four-sided, and ending in a fine sharp point. They endure for six or seven years.
The flowers are produced near the ends of last year's shoots, those with stamens being borne singly or in clusters of two or three. They are about three-quarters of an inch in length, and of a yellow colour, tinged with pink. The cones, which hang downwards, are almost cylindrical, about 5 inches long and 1-1/2 inches in diameter. The pale brown scales are thin, and loosely overlap. The seeds, of which there are two under each scale, are very small, with a transparent brown wing, five times the length of the seed. The flowers appear in May, and the seeds are not ripe until nearly a year later.
The tree is a shallow rooter, the roots going off horizontally in all directions a little below the surface, and becoming intimately matted with those of neighbouring trees. This surface-rooting often leads to disaster in plantations and forests of Spruce, for it is least able of all the firs to withstand a gale, which will sometimes make a broad avenue through the plantation by toppling the trees one against another.
The wood of the Spruce Fir, though light, is even grained, elastic, and durable, and the straightness of its stem makes it very valuable for all purposes where great length and straightness are required, as for the masts of small vessels, ladders, scaffolding, telegraph-poles; as well as for the varied uses the builder finds for its planks. It supplies resin and pitch, and most of the cheaper periodicals now issued largely owe their existence to the Spruce, for its fibres reduced to pulp are made into the paper upon which they are printed. Although its growth during the first few years is rather slow, progress during the next twenty-five years is tolerably rapid, being at the rate of two or three feet per year, if in a favourable situation, and on moist light soil. When grown in a wood the Spruce loses its lower branches early, but when given sufficient "elbow-room," these remain to a good old age, so that from spire to earth the graceful cone of bright green is continuous.
The name Spruce is from the German _sprossen_ (a sprout), in allusion to the numerous short branchlets that are a characteristic of the tree.
The Douglas Fir (_Pseudotsuga douglasii_).
Although the name of this tree in English and Latin might reasonably lead one to suppose that David Douglas, the intrepid botanical explorer, was the discoverer of it, that is not really so. It was Archibald Menzies who first made it known to science, by means of herbarium specimens collected in 1792, when, as the companion of Vancouver, he visited the western coasts of North America. But Douglas, in his capacity of collector to the Royal Horticultural Society, landed at Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River in 1825, and not only sent home herbarium specimens, but seeds also, of this and several previously unknown Conifers. It was by means of these seeds that the Douglas Fir was introduced to Britain. It was already known by Lambert's name of _Abies taxifolia_, but Dr. Lindley, a short time previous to Douglas' untimely death, selected the tree as a suitable and enduring memorial of the enormous services Douglas had rendered, and named it _Abies douglasii_. Since then Carri[e']re has split up the old genus _Abies_ and placed _douglasii_ in the new genus _Pseudotsuga_.
Under the most favourable natural conditions, as around Puget Sound and on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada, the Douglas Fir grows to a height of 300 feet, with a girth of 30 to 40 feet, but on the drier slopes of the Rocky Mountains it is not more than 100 feet high. In Colorado, forests of Douglas Fir are found at an elevation of 11,000 feet. The tree has not been sufficiently long established in this country to say what dimensions it will reach, though it appears to have taken kindly to Ireland and to Devon and Cornwall, where the rate of growth of young trees is about 30 inches per annum. There are plenty of trees in these islands, planted about the year 1834, which have reached or passed 100 feet, and there is no doubt that towards our western coasts this height will be greatly exceeded. Some of these trees have long since produced cones, and from their seeds many young trees have been raised.
The Douglas Fir is of pyramidal outline, with the lowest branches bending to the ground under their weight of branchlets and leaves; above, they spread horizontally, but the uppermost are more or less ascending. The branchlets are given off mostly in opposite pairs, densely clothed with slender, rich green leaves, 3/4 to 1-1/4 inches in length, paler beneath. They endure for six or seven years, and are arranged in three or four ranks. The male flowers will be found clustered at intervals on the underside of the previous year's shoots, whilst the cones are formed at the tips of the lateral branchlets, and hang downwards. These cones are somewhat elliptical in outline, from 2-1/2 to 4 inches long, with large scales, and from the back of each there extends a three-clawed bract, whereof the middle claw or awn is very long. Several well-marked varieties of the Douglas Fir are also to be met with occasionally in parks and gardens.
The Douglas Fir produces excellent timber, and is a most valuable forest tree, not only on that account, but because of its adaptability to varying conditions of soil and climate. It is the most widely distributed of all American forest trees, and the area of its distribution is spread over thirty-two degrees of latitude, and from end to end of this range it has, in the words of Sargent, "to endure the fierce gales and long winters of the north, and the nearly perpetual sunshine of the Mexican Cordilleras; to thrive in the rain and fog which sweep almost continuously along the Pacific coast range, and on the arid mountain slopes of the interior, where for months every year rain never falls." It appears to thrive best where the air is humid and the soil well drained. It begins to bear cones about its twenty-fifth year. The straight tapering trunk is largely used for the masts and spars of ships, its suitability for this purpose being evident to all visitors to Kew who have gazed at the flag-staff set up in the arboretum. This pole is 159 feet long, with a circumference of 6 feet at the base, tapering to 2 feet 2 inches at the top, and weighing about 3 tons. It was brought from Vancouver Island, and an examination of its rings before it was set up showed that it represented the growth of about 250 years. The full life of the Douglas Fir is estimated to be about 750 years.
* * * * *
The Stone Pine (_Pinus pinea_).
Between the tall, graceful spire of the Douglas Fir and the squat, heavy, umbrella-like head of the Stone Pine, there is an enormous contrast. It must be confessed that the Stone Pine is less beautiful than picturesque, a point that strongly commends it to the landscape painter working in the countries bordering the Mediterranean, in which region it is native. The date of its introduction to Britain is not known, but it has been in cultivation here certainly for more than three centuries and a half, for Turner mentions it in his "Names of Herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe, Duch, and Frenche," published in 1548. In its native countries it attains a height of sixty to eighty feet, but in this country the finest examples are only about thirty-five feet, whilst ordinary British-grown examples are only half that height. Its trunk, covered with rugged, and deeply fissured, thick, red-grey bark, forks at no great distance from the roots, and sends off massive spreading branches of great length. For several years the young tree produces short single leaves, but later leaves are five or six inches long, slender, and of a bright green tint, in pairs, united at their base by a pale sheath. These leaves endure for two or three years. The pollen-bearing flowers are crowded into a spike. The female flowers are about three-quarters of an inch long, composed of pale greenish scales. After fertilization, these grow to a length of four to six inches, of a rugged oval form and red-brown colour, ripening in the third year. The scales of these cones are somewhat wedge-shaped, with a stout rhomboid boss, which has a depression round the central protuberance. The seeds, which are eaten for dessert and preserved as sweetmeats in the countries where the Stone Pine is native, are enclosed in a bony shell, and it is from this circumstance that the tree gets its name.
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The Austrian Pine (_Pinus laricio_).
What is known as the Austrian Pine is a variety of the Corsican or Larch Pine, and its botanical name correctly set out is _Pinus laricio_, var. _austriaca_. The name has reference to the fact that its chief home as an indigenous tree is in the southern provinces of the Austrian Empire. The range of the type and its varieties together includes Central and Southern Europe, and part of Western Asia. It is a comparatively recent addition to our sylva in both forms, for the type was introduced in 1759, in the belief that it was a maritime form of the Scots Pine, but the variety _austriaca_ was first sent out by Lawson and Son, the Edinburgh nurserymen, in 1835.
The typical species (Corsican Pine) is a slender tree of somewhat pyramidal form, growing to the height of 80 to 120 feet. The Austrian Pine, though a large tree, is of smaller proportions--from 60 to 80 feet high--but with stouter and longer branches, and denser foliage. The leaves, which vary from three to five inches in length, are sheathed in pairs, convex on the outer side, rigid, glossy, dark green, and with toothed margins. The cone is conical (!), with a rounded base, two to three inches in length, and its position on the branch is almost horizontal, the scales somewhat similar to those of the Scots Pine, but with stronger bosses, and of a yellowish-brown colour, polished. It takes about seventeen months to become full grown and ripen the seeds.
The Austrian Pine is one of those that do well on poor soils, and takes kindly to chalk. From the density of its foliage, it makes a good shade and shelter tree. Its timber, though coarse in grain, is very durable, and useful for outside work.
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Cedar of Lebanon (_Cedrus libani_).
Made familiar, by name at least, from very early times by frequent references to it in the books of the Old Testament, it is rather strange that so hardy a tree was not one of the first of those introduced for ornament into Britain. It is true that local legends attaching to some old Cedars in this country credit them with having been planted in "the spacious times of great Elizabeth"--as the great Cedar at Whitton, Middlesex, blown down in 1779; but, on the other hand, we have the fact that no mention is made of the Cedar by John Evelyn in his "Sylva" (1664). This, it is true, is only negative evidence; but it is strong none the less, for it is not at all likely that so keen and pious an arboriculturist would have omitted mention of so noteworthy a tree had such been growing here when he wrote. There is reason to believe, however, that the still-existing Enfield Cedar was planted about the date of Evelyn's publication by Dr. Uvedale, master of the Enfield Grammar School.
The researches of Sir J. D. Hooker, subsequent to his memorable expedition to Lebanon and Taurus in 1860, established the specific identity of the three Cedars known as the Mount Atlas Cedar, the Cedar of Lebanon, and the Deodar. Though the arboriculturist still treats them as distinct species, they are scientifically regarded as geographical forms of one species. For convenience we here adopt the arboriculturist's view.
The Cedar varies greatly--no tree more so--in height and general outline, according to situation and environment, and though the stature of well-grown trees in this country may be correctly stated as from 50 to 80 feet, we are not without examples of 100 and 120 feet where the conditions have been specially favourable. There is one of 120 feet at Strathfieldsaye, and among the numerous fine Cedars at Goodwood there is the celebrated Great Cedar, 90 feet high, with a bole 25 feet in circumference, and a broad conical head whose base has a diameter of 130 feet. But the Cedar, as usually seen on lawns and in parks, has a low, rounded, or flattened top, the great spreading arms having grown more rapidly than the trunk. Thus grown, the huge bole has seldom any great length, throwing out these timber branches at from six to ten feet from the ground, and immediately afterwards the trunk is divided into several stems. From these the main branches take a curving direction, at first ascending, but the part furthest from the trunk becoming almost horizontal. It is chiefly at the extremity of the branches that the branchlets and leaves are produced.
The evergreen leaves last for three, four, or five years, and are of needle-shape, varying in length from a little less to a little more than an inch. They are produced in a similar manner to those of the Larch--in tufts that are arranged spirally round dwarf shoots, mostly on the upper side of the branchlets. The male flowers are to be found at the extremity of branchlets which, though six or seven years old, are very short, their development having been arrested. The solid, purple-brown cones are only three or four inches long, broad-topped, and with a diameter of about half the length; the scales thin and closely pressed together; they are at first greyish-green, tinged with pink. The development and maturity of these cones takes two or three seasons, and they remain on the tree for several years longer. The seeds are angular, with a wedge-shaped wing.
The trees do not produce cones until they are from twenty-five to thirty years old; but they may be a century old before producing either male or female flowers.
The trunk is covered with thick, rough, deeply fissured bark. On the branches the bark is smooth, and peels off in thin flakes. The Cedar, in its native habitat, produces admirable timber, but that of trees grown in our own country is described by Loudon as "reddish-white, light and spongy, easily worked, but very apt to shrink and warp, and by no means durable." For these reasons the tree is grown almost solely for ornament.
The name Cedar is supposed to be derived from the Arabic _kedroum_, or _k[e']dre_ (power), and has reference to its majestic proportions and strong timber.
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The Deodar, or Indian Cedar (_Cedrus deodara_).
Although, as we have indicated, the differences between the Cedar of Lebanon and the Cedar of Himalaya are not such as can be scientifically accepted as constituting specific distinctness, they are sufficient to at once strike the ordinary observer. In proportion to the height of the trunk, for example, the main branches are much shorter, the result being a more regular pyramidal outline, terminating in a light spire. The terminal shoots of the branches are longer, more slender, and quite pendulous. These differences, though really slight, transform the rather heavy majesty of the Cedar, as represented by _C. libani_, into one of graceful beauty. Although the experience of sixty years has sadly falsified the high hopes entertained as to the suitability of the Deodar for cultivation in this country as a timber tree, its value for ornamental purposes and in landscape gardening has not been impaired.
The headquarters of the Deodar are in the mountains of north-west India, where it forms forests at various altitudes above 3500 feet. Its vertical distribution, indeed, extends to a height of 12,000 feet, but its principal habitat lies between 6000 and 10,000 feet. Deodar timber produced in its native forests is exceedingly durable, being compact and even grained, not liable to warp or split, and standing the test of being alternately wet and dry. Loudon states that when a building, which had been erected by the Emperor Akbar in the latter part of the sixteenth century, was pulled down between 1820 and 1825, the Deodar timber used in its construction was found to be so sound that it was again used in building a house for Rajah Shah. And Brandis tells of very much more ancient bridges in Srunagar, whose piers are of Deodar wood, and appear to be as yet unaffected by decay.
It is to the Hon. W. L. Melville that we are indebted for the introduction of the Deodar to Britain in 1831, and during the next ten years many young trees were raised here from seeds. Favourably impressed by the rapidity of growth of these seedlings, the government, fearing a coming shortage of Oak for naval purposes, imported and distributed large numbers of Deodar seeds, and high estimates were formed of the future value of these trees. But in framing these estimates one important factor was omitted--the uncertainty of the British climate, with its rapid changes, "everything by turns, and nothing long." A score or two of years served to demonstrate that such conditions were opposed to the longevity and uniform development that produced sound timber on the Indian mountains; and to-day the Deodar is not mentioned among the trees that are to bring riches to the British timber grower. In spite of this failure, there are to be seen in many parts of these islands fine young Deodars of forty or fifty years, and from fifty to seventy feet in height.
There is no necessity for repeating the particulars already given respecting the Cedar of Lebanon, and which apply to the Deodar with such modifications as are indicated in the first paragraph above. Specimens grown where they have sufficient space for spreading out their long arms, retain their branches to the base of the trunk, and if these are cut off they can reproduce them. Several nursery varieties--with golden (_aurea_), silvery (_argentea_), or more intense green (_viridis_) foliage than the type--have appeared as a result of European cultivation.
* * * * *
Lawson's Cypress (_Cupressus lawsoniana_).
Lawson's Cypress belongs to that section of Conifers which includes the Junipers and Thuias, and is a representative of the North American Sylva. It is a native of South Oregon and North California, where it is believed to have been first discovered by Jeffrey, about 1852. Two years later seeds were received by Messrs. Lawson, the Edinburgh nurserymen, from Mr. William Murray, and from these seeds were raised the first young trees of this species sent out by the firm. The name was bestowed in honour of Mr. Charles Lawson, the then head of the firm, and by this name it is generally known in Europe, but in the United States it is the Port Orford Cypress. At Port Orford, on the Oregon coast, according to Sargent, "it forms one of the most prolific and beautiful coniferous forests of the continent, unsurpassed in the variety and luxuriance of its undergrowth of Rhododendrons, Vacciniums, Raspberries, Buckthorns, and Ferns," and any one who has seen well-grown specimens in the pleasure-grounds of this country can easily realize something of the beauty of such a forest, though allowance has to be made for the fact that in forest growth the lower branches are lost at an early age.
In its native home the Lawson Cypress attains a height of between 120 and 150 feet, occasionally reaching 200 feet, with a base circumference of 40 feet. The thick brown bark splits into rounded scaly ridges. The short horizontal branches divide a good deal towards their leafy extremities, which are curved, and commonly drooping. The leaves are little evergreen scales, which overlap, and being closely pressed to the branchlet, completely clothe and hide it. They are bright dark-green in colour, and endure for three or four years. The male flowers are produced at the tips of short branchlets, formed a year earlier. They are of cylindric form, crimson in colour, and each stamen bears from two to six anther-cells. The small "cones" are more or less globular, but instead of a large number of spirally arranged overlapping scales, as in the Pines and Firs, here there are only eight, whose edges at first join to form a box. When the "cone" is ripe these scales separate, to allow the escape of the seeds.
The Lawson Cypress produces a valuable wood, close-grained and strong, yet light. It is considered one of the most important timber trees of North America; but in this country it has been planted solely with a view to its ornamental qualities. Its perfect hardiness and its freedom of growth may, with longer experience than half a century affords, lead to its being regarded as a timber producer here also.
The Common Cypress (_Cupressus sempervirens_) of the Mediterranean region and the East, of which poets have sung in all ages, has been cultivated in this country for at least three hundred and fifty years.
The Chili Pine (_Araucaria imbricata_).
The Chili Pine, or "Monkey Puzzle," is a familiar sight on suburban lawns, where, however, it seldom attains a large size or long retains health. The lower branches drop off, and the upper ones become brown, as though scorched. But away from the smoke-laden atmosphere and uncongenial soils, some handsome and massive Araucarias may be seen rising from fair lawns, with dense branches curving at their tips, and regularly disposed in whorls from the dome-like head of the tree to the grass at its base. Such was the magnificent specimen at Dropmore that died in 1902, such is the fine tree at Woodstock, Co. Kilkenny, which now presumably takes the position of eminence in these islands hitherto held by the Dropmore example.
The Chili Pine is a native of Southern Chili, where it was discovered by a Spaniard, Don F. Dendariarena, in 1780, as he was prospecting for timber. About the same time two other Spaniards, Drs. Ruiz and Pavon, were botanizing in Chili, and came across the Araucaria, of which they sent herbarium specimens to Europe. But in spite of this three-fold opportunity for Spain, the actual introduction of the Araucaria to Europe must be credited to Britain. Archibald Menzies, who accompanied Captain Vancouver as botanist on his celebrated voyage, came across the tree in Chili, and brought home both seeds and young plants. One of these became a fine tree at Kew, where it was for many years the object of admiration and interest, but it perished in 1892.
The Araucaria forms extensive pure forests in the province of Arauco, from which it gets its name, and to whose inhabitants the seeds are a most important item of their food-supply. Not only do the trees in these forests lose their lower branches, but even those growing in the open plains of their native country have similarly bare trunks for nearly half their height. It is therefore a satisfaction to know that the finest specimens grown in this country have really surpassed those grown in their natural home. The height reached by old trees is from eighty to a hundred feet, with a trunk-girth of from sixteen to twenty-three feet. The tapering of this trunk is very slight, and a few of the stiff, spine-tipped leaves, with which its younger extremity is densely clothed, still remain attached in a dried-up condition far down the column. These leaves will have been observed to entirely cover the branches, not being restricted, as in most trees, to the newly formed branchlets and twigs. They are very hard, and endure for about fifteen years; are about an inch and a quarter long, and overlap, though their sharp-pointed ends turn away from the branch.
The cylindrical male flowers are four or five inches long, borne singly or in small clusters. It was formerly supposed that the sexes were on separate trees, but though many individuals only produce flowers of one kind, this is by no means the general rule. The female flowers are about four inches long, almost round in shape, but broader at the base than above. They are covered with long, narrow, overlapping scales, beneath which are found the seeds when the flower has developed into the brown cone, which is six inches in diameter. The scales are then easily detached; in fact, when the seeds are ripe, the cone falls to pieces. The seed is about an inch and a half long, enclosed in a hard, thin shell.
The Chili Pine does not succeed in this country unless it is given pure air, sunshine, abundant moisture, and an open subsoil to carry it off. Yet it will grow to a very handsome tree if these conditions are observed. Very fine effects have been obtained in some places by planting an Araucaria grove. Such an avenue is in fine condition at Woodstock, Co. Kilkenny (running parallel with an avenue of _Abies nobilis_), every tree with its branches intact from turf to summit, and bearing fertile cones. There is a similar, but less perfectly preserved, Araucaria grove at Bicton in Devonshire.
CLASSIFIED INDEX
TO
NATURAL ORDERS, GENERA AND SPECIES
_Described in this work._
Order TILIACEAE.
TILIA platyphyllos, Scop., 36, 40. _Plates_ 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 " parvifolia, Ehrh., 37, 40 " vulgaris, Hayne, 37, 40
Order ILICINEAE.
ILEX aquifolium, L., 85. _Plates_ 81, 82, 83, 84
Order CELASTRINEAE.
EUONYMUS europaeus, L., 88. _Plates_ 85, 86, 87 " japonicus, Thunb., 90 " latifolius, C. Bauh., 90
Order RHAMNEAE.
RHAMNUS catharticus, L., 90. _Plate_ 89 " frangula, L., 91. _Plates_ 88, 90
Order SAPINDACEAE.
AESCULUS hippocastanum, L., 139. _Plates_ 1, 144, 145, 146, 147 " carnea, Willd., 143
ACER campestre, L., 49. _Plate_ 43 " platanoides, L., 53 " pseudo-platanus, L., 51. _Plates_ 44, 45, 46, 47, 48
Order LEGUMINOSAE.
LABURNUM vulgare, Presl., 145. _Plate_ 149
ROBINIA pseudacacia, L., 147. _Plates_ 150, 151, 152
Order ROSACEAE.
PRUNUS communis, Hudson, 92. _Plates_ 92, 93 " insititia, L., 94 " domestica, L., 94. _Plate_ 91 " avium, L., 95. _Plates_ 94, 95 " cerasus, L., 97 " padus, L., 98. _Plates_ 96, 97, 99
PYRUS communis, L., 98. _Plates_ 100, 102, 103 " cordata, Desv., 100 " malus, L., 101. _Plates_ 98, 101, 104, 105, 106 " aria, Ehrh., 103. _Plates_ 107, 108, 109, 110 " latifolia, Syme, 105 " scandica, Syme, 105 " torminalis, DC., 105 " aucuparia, Gaert., 106. _Plates_ 111, 112, 113, 114 " sorbus, Gaert., 109. _Plates_ 115, 117, 119 " germanica, Hook., 110. _Plate_ 116
CRATAEGUS oxyacantha, Pall., 112. _Plates_ 118, 120, 121, 122, 123
Order CORNACEAE.
CORNUS sanguinea, L., 116. _Plates_ 125, 126 " suecica, L., 118
Order CAPRIFOLIACEAE.
SAMBUCUS nigra, L., 123. _Plates_ 129, 131
VIBURNUM opulus, L., 120. _Plate_ 130 " lantana, L., 118. _Plates_ 127, 128
Order ERICACEAE.
ARBUTUS unedo, L., 114. _Plate_ 124
Order OLEACEAE.
FRAXINUS excelsior, L., 45. _Plates_ 39, 40, 41, 42
Order LAURACEAE.
LAURUS nobilis, L., 143. _Plate_ 148
Order EUPHORBIACEAE.
BUXUS sempervirens, L., 125. _Plates_ 132, 133
Order URTICACEAE.
ULMUS montana, Stokes, 40. _Plates_ 32, 33, 34, 35 " campestris, L., 43. _Plates_ 36, 37, 38
Order PLATANACEAE.
PLATANUS orientalis, L., 128. _Plates_ 134, 135, 136 " occidentalis, L., 129
Order JUGLANDACEAE.
JUGLANS regia, L., 131. _Plates_ 137, 138, 139
Order CUPULIFERAE.
BETULA alba, L., 25. _Plates_ 13, 14, 15, 16 " verrucosa, Ehrh., 28 " pubescens, Ehrh., 28 " nana, L., 28
ALNUS glutinosa, Medic., 29. _Plates_ 17, 18, 19, 20
CARPINUS betulus, L., 31. _Plates_ 21, 22, 23, 24
CORYLUS avellana, L., 34. _Plates_ 25, 26
QUERCUS robur, L., 13. _Plates_ 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 " ilex, L., 18. _Plate_ 6 " cerris, L., 19. _Plate_ 7
CASTANEA sativa, Mill., 135. _Plates_ 140, 141, 142, 143
FAGUS sylvatica, L., 20. _Plates_ 8, 9, 11, 12
Order SALICINEAE.
SALIX triandra, L., 66. _Plates_ 66, 67 " pentandra, L., 66. _Plates_ 68, 69, 70 " fragilis, L., 63. _Plates_ 59, 60, 61 " russelliana, Sm., 64 " alba, L., 65. _Plates_ 62, 63, 64, 65 " cinerea, L., 68 " aurita, L., 68 " caprea, L., 67 " repens, L., 69 " nigricans, Sm., 69 " phylicifolia, L., 70 " arbuscula, L., 72 " viminalis, L., 70 " reticulata, L., 72 " purpurea, L., 71. _Plates_ 71, 72 " lanata, L., 71 " sadleri, Syme, 71 " lapponum, L., 72 " myrsinites, L., 72 " herbacea, L., 72 " babylonica, Hort., 73
POPULUS alba, L., 55. _Plates_ 49, 50, 51 " canescens, Sm., 56 " tremula, L., 56. _Plate_ 52 " nigra, L., 58. _Plates_ 53, 54, 55 " fastigiata, Desf., 60. _Plates_ 56, 57, 58 " balsamifera, L., 61 " monilifera, Hort., 61
Order TAXACEAE.
TAXUS baccata, L., 74. _Plates_ 73, 74, 76
Order CONIFERAE.
JUNIPERUS communis, L., 79. _Plates_ 75, 77 " bermudiana, L., 81 " virginiana, L., 81
CUPRESSUS lawsoniana, Murr., 169. _Plates_ 173, 174
ARAUCARIA imbricata, Pav., 171. _Plate_ 175
PICEA excelsa, Link., 155. _Plates_ 159, 160, 163
CEDRUS deodara, Loud., 167. _Plates_ 171, 172 " libani, Loud., 164. _Plates_ 169, 170
LARIX europaea, DC., 149. _Plates_ 153, 154, 155, 156
ABIES pectinata, DC., 152. _Plates_ 157, 158
PSEUDOTSUGA douglasii, Carr, 157. _Plates_ 161, 162
PINUS sylvestris, L., 81. _Plates_ 78, 79, 80 " laricio, Poir., 162. _Plates_ 166, 167, 168 " pinea, L., 160. _Plates_ 164, 165
INDEX.
Abele, 55. _Plates_ 49, 50, 51
_Abies pectinata_, 152. _Plates_ 157, 158
_Acer campestre_, 49. _Plate_ 43 " _platanoides_, 53 " _pseudoplatanus_, 51. _Plates_ 44, 45, 46
_Aesculus carnea_, 143 " _hippocastanum_, 139. _Plates_ 1, 144, 145, 146, 147
Alder, 29, _Plates_ 17, 18, 19, 20; Berry-bearing Alder, 91, _Plates_ 88, 90
_Alnus glutinosa_, 29. _Plates_ 17, 18, 19, 20
Apple, Wild, 101. _Plates_ 98, 101, 104, 105, 106
_Araucaria imbricata_, 171. _Plate_ 175
_Arbutus unedo_, 114. _Plate_ 124
Ash, 45, _Plates_ 39, 40, 41, 42; Mountain Ash, 106, _Plates_ 111, 112, 113, 114
Aspen, 56. _Plate_ 52
Austrian Pine, 162. _Plates_ 166, 167, 168
Bay Tree, 143. _Plate_ 148
Beech, 20. _Plates_ 8, 9, 11, 12
_Betula alba_, 25. _Plates_ 13, 14, 15, 16 " _nana_, 28
Birch, 25, _Plates_ 13, 14, 15, 16; Dwarf Birch, 28
Blackthorn, 92. _Plates_ 92, 93
Box, 125. _Plates_ 132, 133
Buckthorns, 90; Breaking Buckthorn, 91, _Plates_ 88, 90; Purging Buckthorn, 90, _Plate_ 89
Bullace, 94
_Buxus sempervirens_, 125. _Plates_ 132, 133
_Carpinus betulus_, 31. _Plates_ 21, 22, 23, 24
_Castanea sativa_, 135. _Plates_ 140, 141, 142, 143
Cedar of Lebanon, 164, _Plates_ 169, 170; Indian Cedar, 167, _Plates_ 171, 172; Red Cedar, 81
_Cedrus deodara_, 167. _Plates_ 171, 172 " _libani_, 164. _Plates_ 169, 170
Cherry, Wild, 95, _Plates_ 94, 95; Dwarf Cherry, 97; Bird Cherry, 98, _Plates_ 96, 97, 99
Chestnut, Horse, 139, _Plates_ 1, 144, 145, 146, 147; Sweet Chestnut, 135. _Plates_ 140, 141, 142, 143
Chili Pine, 171. _Plate_ 175
Conifers, Native, 73; Exotic, 149
Cornel, 116; Dwarf Cornel, 118
_Cornus sanguinea_, 116. _Plates_ 125, 126 " _suecica_, 118
_Corylus avellana_, 34. _Plates_ 25, 26
Crab, 101. _Plates_ 98, 101, 104, 105, 106
_Crataegus oxyacantha_, 112. _Plates_ 118, 120, 121, 122, 123
_Cupressus lawsoniana_, 169. _Plates_ 173, 174
Deodar, 167. _Plates_ 171, 172
Dogwood, 116. _Plates_ 125, 126
Douglas Fir, 157. _Plates_ 161, 162
Elder, 123. _Plates_ 129, 131
Elms, 40; Wych Elm, 40, _Plates_ 32, 33, 34, 35; Common Elm, 43, _Plates_ 36, 37, 38
_Euonymus europaeus_, 88. _Plates_ 85, 86, 87 " _japonicus_, 90 " _latifolius_, 90
_Fagus sylvatica_, 20. _Plates_ 8, 9, 11, 12
False Acacia, 147. _Plates_ 150, 151, 152
False Plane, 51. _Plates_ 44, 45, 46, 47, 48
Fir, Douglas, 157. _Plates_, 161, 162; Silver Fir, 152. _Plates_ 157, 158; Spruce Fir, 155. _Plates_ 159, 160, 163
Fraxinus excelsior, 45. _Plates_ 39, 40, 41, 42
Gean, 96. _Plates_ 94, 95
Guelder Rose, 120. _Plate_ 130
Hawthorn, 112. _Plates_ 118, 120, 121, 122, 123
Hazel, 34. _Plates_ 25, 26
Holly, 85. _Plates_ 81, 82, 83, 84
Holm Oak, 18. _Plate_ 6
Hornbeam, 31. _Plates_ 21, 22, 23, 24
Horse Chestnut, 139. _Plates_ 1, 144, 145, 146, 147; Red-flowered Horse Chestnut, 143
_Ilex aquifolium_, 85. _Plates_ 81, 82, 83, 84
_Juglans regia_, 131. _Plates_ 137, 138, 139
Juniper, 79. _Plates_ 75, 77; Virginian Juniper, 81
_Juniperus bermudiana_, 81 " _communis_, 79. _Plates_ 75, 77 " _virginiana_, 81
Laburnum, 145. _Plate_ 149; White Laburnum, 147
_Laburnum vulgare_, 145. _Plate_ 149
Larch, 149. _Plates_ 153, 154, 155, 156
_Larix europaea_, 149. _Plates_ 153, 154, 155, 156
_Laurus nobilis_, 143. _Plate_ 148
Lawson's Cypress, 169. _Plates_ 173, 174
Lime, 36. _Plates_ 27, 28, 29, 30, 31
Locust Tree, 147. _Plates_ 150, 151, 152
Maples, 49; Field or Common, 49. _Plate_ 43; Great Maple, 51. _Plates_ 44, 45, 46, 47, 48; Norway Maple, 53
May, 112. _Plates_ 118, 120, 121, 122, 123
Medlar, 110. _Plate_ 116
Monkey Puzzle, 171. _Plate_ 175
Norway Maple, 53
Oak, 13. _Plates_ 2, 3, 4, 5, 10; Holm Oak, 18. _Plate_ 6; Turkey Oak, 19. _Plate_ 7
Osier, 70; Purple Osier, 71. _Plates_ 71, 72
Pear, Wild, 98. _Plates_ 100, 102, 103
_Picea excelsa_, 155. _Plates_ 159, 160, 163
Pine, Austrian, 162. _Plates_, 166, 167, 168; Chili Pine, 171. _Plate_ 175; Scots Pine, 81. _Plates_ 78, 79, 80; Stone Pine, 160. _Plates_ 164, 165
_Pinus laricio_, 162. _Plates_ 166, 167, 168 " _pinea_, 160. _Plates_ 164, 165 " _sylvestris_, 81. _Plates_ 78, 79, 80
Planes, 128; Oriental Plane, 128; Occidental Plane, 129; Maple-leaved Plane, 131. _Plates_ 134, 135, 136
_Platanus occidentalis_, 129 " _orientalis_, 128. _Plates_ 134, 135, 136
Plums, Wild, 92, 94. _Plates_ 91, 92, 93
Poplars, 54; White Poplar, 55. _Plates_ 49, 50, 51; Grey Poplar, 55; Black Poplar, 58. _Plates_ 53, 54, 55; Lombardy Poplar, 60. _Plates_ 56, 57, 58; Black Italian Poplar, 61; Balsam Poplar, 61
_Populus alba_, 55. _Plates_ 49, 50, 51 " _balsamifera_, 61 " _canescens_, 55 " _fastigiata_, 60. _Plates_ 56, 57, 58 " _monilifera_, 61 " _nigra_, 58. _Plates_ 53, 54, 55 " _tremula_, 56. _Plate_ 52
_Prunus avium_, 95. _Plates_ 94, 95 " _cerasus_, 97 " _communis_, 92. _Plates_ 92, 93 " _domestica_, 94. _Plate_ 91 " _insititia_, 94 " _padus_, 98. _Plates_ 96, 97, 99
_Pseudotsuga douglasii_, 157. _Plates_ 161, 162
_Pyrus aria_, 103. _Plates_ 107, 108, 109, 110 " _aucuparia_, 106. _Plates_ 111, 112, 113, 114 " _communis_, 98. _Plates_ 100, 102, 103 " _cordata_, 100 " _germanica_, 110. Plate 116 " _latifolia_, 105 " _malus_, 101. _Plates_ 98, 101, 104, 105, 106 " _scandica_, 105 " _sorbus_, 109. _Plates_ 115, 117, 119 " _torminalis_, 105
_Quercus cerris_, 19. _Plate_ 7 " _ilex_, 18. _Plate_ 6 " _robur_, 13. _Plates_ 2, 3, 4, 5, 10
_Rhamnus catharticus_, 90. _Plate_ 89 " _frangula_, 91. _Plates_ 88, 90
_Robinia pseudacacia_, 147. _Plates_ 150, 151, 152
Rowan, 106. _Plates_ 111, 112, 113, 114
_Salix alba_, 65. _Plates_ 62, 63, 64, 65 " _arbuscula_, 72 " _aurita_, 68 " _babylonica_, 73 " _capraea_, 67 " _cinerea_, 67 " _fragilis_, 63. _Plates_ 59, 60, 61 " _herbacea_, 72 " _lanata_, 71 " _lapponum_, 72 " _myrsinites_, 72 " _nigricans_, 69
_Salix pentandra_, 66. _Plates_ 68, 69, 70 " _phylicifolia_, 70 " _purpurea_, 71. _Plates_ 71, 72 " _repens_, 69 " _reticulata_, 72 " _russelliana_, 64 " _sadleri_, 71 " _triandra_, 65. _Plates_ 66, 67 " _viminalis_, 70
Sallow, 67; Grey Sallow, 68; Eared Sallow, 68
_Sambucus nigra_, 123. _Plates_ 129, 131
Scots Pine, 81. _Plates_ 78, 79, 80
Service, Wild, 105; True Service, 109. _Plates_ 115, 117, 119
Silver Fir, 152. _Plates_ 157, 158
Sloe, 92. Plates 92, 93
Spindle-tree, 88. _Plates_ 85, 86, 87
Spruce Fir, 155. _Plates_ 159, 160, 163
Stone Pine, 160. _Plates_ 164, 165
Strawberry-tree, 114. _Plate_ 124
Sweet Chestnut, 135. _Plates_ 140, 141, 142, 143
Sycamore, 51. _Plates_ 44, 45, 46, 47, 48
Tacamahac, 61
_Tilia parvifolia_, 37, 40 " _platyphyllos_, 36, 40. _Plates_ 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 " _vulgaris_, 37, 40
Turkey Oak, 19. _Plate_ 7
_Ulmus campestris_, 43. _Plates_ 36, 37, 38 " _montana_, 40. _Plates_ 32, 33, 34, 35
_Viburnum lantana_, 118. _Plates_ 127, 128 " _opulus_, 120. _Plate_ 130
Walnut, 131. _Plates_ 137, 138, 139
Wayfaring-tree, 118. _Plates_ 127, 128
White Beam, 103. _Plates_ 107, 108, 109, 110
Whitethorn, 112. _Plates_ 118, 120, 121, 122, 123
Willows, 61; Crack Willow, 63. _Plates_ 59, 60, 61; Bedford Willow, 64; White Willow, 65. _Plates_ 62, 63, 64, 65; Golden Willow, 65; Almond-leaved Willow, 66. _Plates_ 66, 67; French Willow, 66; Bay-leaved Willow, 67. _Plates_ 68, 69, 70; Dwarf Silky Willow, 69; Dark-leaved Willow, 69; Tea-leaved Willow, 70; Woolly Willow, 71; Sadler's Willow, 71; Lapland Willow, 72; Whortle-leaved Willow, 72; Small Tree Willow, 72; Least Willow, 72; Net-leaved Willow, 72; Weeping Willow, 73
Withy, 63. _Plates_ 59, 60, 61
Wych Elm, 40. _Plates_ 33, 34, 35
Yew, 74. _Plates_ 73, 74, 76; Irish Yew, 79
THE END.
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
End of Project Gutenberg's Wayside and Woodland Trees, by Edward Step