HARDJVICRE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



203 



•and tatters, the clothes sacrificed being left nailed to 

 the tree till they drop to pieces of themselves. The 

 Oriental plane is thought to be a great purifier of the 

 air, and also, it is said, defends cities and other 

 places, where it is grown, from the plague. Evelyn 

 says, "A worthy knight, who staid at Ispahan 

 when that city was infected with a raging pestilence, 

 told him that since they have planted a greater 

 number of these noble trees about it the plague had 

 not come nigh their dwellings." The plane is hardly 

 less beloved by the Turks in modern days ; it is a 

 usual practice with them to plant one at the birth of 

 a son ; and they appear to enjoy no greater luxury 

 than that of reclining under the umbrageous branches 

 of these majestic trees, smoking their tobacco in a 

 perfect state of indifference to all sublunary things. 

 No part of Europe can boast of such gigantic plane- 

 trees as those that are to be found in the neighbour- 

 hood of the Sublime Porte. Close to the Bosphorus 

 stands what is called the plane-tree of Buyutidere, 

 known also as the plane-tree of Godfrey of Bouillon, 

 who is said to have rested under its shade when 

 leading his army to Jerusalem in 1097. It has the 

 appearance of a single tree, but on close inspection is 

 found to consist of nine closely joined together. The 

 circumference of the united trunks is over 133 feet. 

 The height of the group is 195 feet, and the circum- 

 ference of the spread of the branches is 364 feet. 

 Part of the trunk lias been hollowed out by fire, and 

 eight or ten persons can be sheltered in the cavity. 



Lady Craven, in her letters, speaks of some plane- 

 trees she saw in the Turkish dominions, of such 

 magnitude that the largest trees we have in England 

 placed near them would appear only like broomsticks. 



The Hebrew word Armon, translated Chestnut in 

 the Scriptures, as one of the trees from which Jacob 

 took rods, in which he pulled white strakes to set 

 them before Labans flocks when they came to drink 

 (Gen. xxx. 37), is supposed to refer to the Oriental 

 plane. In Eccles. xxiv. 14, wisdom is compared to 

 a plane-tree by the waters. In Ezek. xxxi. 8, the 

 Armon is spoken of as one of the glories of Assyria 

 (see Smith, "Dictionary of the Bible"). 



The American plane-tree {Platatius occidcutalis) 

 was introduced into this country, in 1636, by John 

 Tradescant. It grows naturally within the same 

 latitudes of the Western world that Platatius orientalis 

 flourishes in the East. This species is far more 

 common than its Eastern relative, and is to be found 

 especially in some of the close courts, the parks, and 

 squares of London, where the smoky atmosphere 

 appears to agree with it better than any other tree. 



Within the precise boundaries of the City, according 

 to the "Gardener's Magazine" for 1877, there are 

 about 1200 established thriving trees, excluding all 

 such under-shrubs as privets, lilacs, &c, and compris- 

 ing at least thirty species and varieties ; out of this 

 number there are 520 planes — some remarkable for 

 their size and stature, for example, the plane at the 



corner of Wood Street, Cheapside, in which not 

 many years since a small colony of rooks made 

 their abode in its branches, and for some six or seven 

 years after they quitted it, their nests remained, and 

 were annually patched and occupied by the City 

 sparrows. 



In many other spots the plane is to be seen en- 

 livening with its refreshing greenery the wilderness 

 of brick, mortar, and asphalte. There are some 

 splendid specimens of the Western plane to be seen 

 in Mecklenburgh and Russell Squares. The young 

 trees on the Thames Embankment are all of the 

 American species, and, being of rapid growth, are 

 well suited for the purpose for which they were 

 planted. The Western plane, in magnitude and 

 general appearance, bears so close a resemblance to the 

 Oriental that many persons confound them together, 

 but they are easily distinguished from each other. 

 The leaves of the American plane are larger and less 

 deeply lobed, their petioles or footstalks being of a 

 red colour ; those of the Oriental, green. The fruit, 

 or rough ball-shaped catkin which we see gracefully 

 suspended from the branches, not unlike chain-shot, 

 in the winter months, is much larger and rather 

 smoother than those of the Eastern plane. The 

 flowers of both species are contained in the small 

 globular catkin we see hanging from the branches 

 just as the tree is coming into leaf, but are so minute 

 as to require a glass to distinguish them. 



The seeds ripen late in the autumn, and are not 

 unlike those of the lettuce, surrounded with a kind 

 of down, by which they are transported to a consider- 

 able distance by the wind. The young shoots and 

 leaves are also covered with down, which becomes 

 detached from them in the course of the summer. 

 In some parts of the United States, where the tree 

 is very abundant, the inhabitants, according to Mi- 

 chaux, regard this down with dread, as they think it 

 has a tendency to produce irritation of the lungs, and 

 finally consumption. In the States it is known as 

 the cotton-tree from this clown, and also button-wood 

 from the shape of its catkins. The growth of the 

 foliage of these trees is different from others. Most 

 trees when the leaves have reached maturity fall off 

 on their own accord, without being at all pushed off 

 by new ones, which are yet in embryo, and do not 

 occupy the place of the old leaves, but are only 

 formed contiguous to them, except in the plane, the 

 new leaf of which is found precisely under the base 

 of the footstalk of the old leaf. Loudon tells us that 

 the head of the plane-tree, during summer, often 

 abounds in what painters call flickering lights ; the 

 consequence of the branches separating themselves 

 into what may be called horizontal undulating strata, 

 or, as it is called in artistical phraseology, tufting, 

 easily put in motion by the wind, and through open- 

 ings in which the rays of the sun penetrate and 

 strike on the foliage below. A peculiarity of these 

 trees is the property of throwing off their bark in 



