310 



TEE GABDENEB'S MONTELY 



[October, 



splendid varieties of portulacca. Beginning in 

 May, they continue to bloom in great profusion 

 throughout the whole season. Where several 

 of them grow near together, they cover the sur- 

 face with their branching stems, and make a 

 bed of dazzling beauty throughout the summer. 

 It seeds freely, and the seed is easily procured 

 by a little attention. It is quite tenacious of life, 

 and it is readily transplanted, so that it is an easy 

 matter to have a fine bed, or even a whole yard 

 or lawn covered with these rich colored flowers. 

 Occasionally we see them transplanted to the 

 garden or yard here, but on account of their 

 commonness but little attention is given to their 

 cultivation. This is certainly worthy of more 

 attention in the States further east than it is 

 receiving. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Poisoning by Laburnum. — The leaves, and 

 especially the roots of Laburnum, are poisonous. 

 European papers often have accounts of injury 

 to the health of animals that have eaten it. 



Trees, Rain-fall, and the Lakes. — M. Fari- 

 bault, Minnesota, desires "to know whether the 

 lowering of the water level of some lakes is not 

 an evidence that the rain-fall is diminishing by 

 the cutting away of the forests?" We have no 

 wish to fevive this controversy. We will only 

 say that if it is evidence to him, it is not to us. 

 Lakes sometimes rise as unaccountably as they 

 fall, and we are inclined to think no one knows 

 why. Never mind the lakes, however. Plant 

 trees. We shall need all for timber, whether 

 the lakes rise or fall or not. 



Age of the Mammoth Trees. Sequoia gigantea. 

 — Professor Gray has steadily combated the pop- 

 ular notion that these trees are several thousand 

 years old. Mr. J. G. Lemmon, one of the most 

 esteemed of California botanists, has recently 

 sent a long account of a visit to the trees, to the 

 Pacific Rural Press, from which we take the fol- 

 lowing extracts : 



"The stump of the very large tree which was 

 bored ofi'with pump augers in 1852 to form the 

 floor of a house, affords a fine opportunity for 

 counting, since it is so evenly smoothed ofi"; but 

 still more time is necessary to do it accurately 

 than most observers allow themselves. This tree 

 should certainly be considered a fair sample of 



the oldest of the present generation, for it is one 

 of the largest ever seen. Its circuit at base is 97 

 feet by my tape line, held at one end by a Puri- 

 tan and master builder from Boston. Longest 

 diameter without bark, five feet above the base, 

 24 feet 10 inches. Shortest diameter, 22 feet 

 eight inches. The bark averages 18 inches in 

 thickness, making the entire longest diameter of 

 the tree at five feet above base, over 27 feet. A 

 few other trees are met with measuring as much 

 or more at base, but they are generally swollen 

 outward, and hollow like the shaft of a light 

 house. This monster tree was as straight and 

 sound as a candle, hence it was undoubtedly the 

 largest perfect tree ever yet seen. 



I spent nearly a day counting the rings of this 

 stump, and of the butt cut of the tree lying near 

 it. I counted carefully both ways, putting in 

 pins to mark the place of hundreds. The stump 

 being a little irregular in consequence of its 

 near roots, I counted in three places along three 

 equidistant rays. The first count was 1,260 

 rings, the second count was 1,258 rings, and the 

 third count was 1,261 rings — average age, 1,260 

 years. Counting on the butt, cut 24 feet from 

 the base, the rings were of course a few less, 

 1,242 in number, but all very plainly discernible, 

 and presenting exact uniformity in their decrease 

 in thickness from heart to bark. I availed of 

 this uniformity of decrease by establishing, after 

 many counts of different trees, a rule for deter- 

 mining the mean number of rings to the linear 

 foot, and fixing the locality on a cut across these 

 trees where the rings are of average thickness. 

 That point is just one-third of the distance from 

 the bark to the heart. At the heart the grains 

 are often three-eighths of an inch thick, at the 

 bark as thin as paper. The average, as deter- 

 mined by countings of all the logs in the grove 

 which have been cut across, some half dozen or 

 more, clearly established the rule that the rings 

 of average width are found one-third of the way 

 from the bark to the heart. This rule proved 

 very useful afterward in estimating age of broken 

 trunks. 



As late as February last the writer saw a speci 

 men of Sequoia in the Central Pacific railroad 

 collection at San Francisco for the Centennial 

 exhibition, which was sent from the Calaveras 

 Mammoth Grove, and is marked "four thousand 

 years old." 



Now I firmly believe with Dr. Gray that this 

 is an " over-statement," and, as I said, I am glad 

 that it is such. Let India with her banian tree 



