GLEANINGS AND ORIGINAL MEMORANDA. 77 
552. ARAUCARIA COOKII. R. Brown. (alias Cupressus columnaris Forster; aliàs Dombeya colum- 
naris Fw T aliàs Araucaria columnaris Hooker.) See our Vol. II. p. 132, No. 403. (Fig. 272.) 
In the Bot. Mag., t. 4635, are the following remarks upon this plant, in addition to aa made in the Journal of the 
Horticultural cte and v gnat at the place i in our pud eia referred to. 
‘To Ca in his s voyage, is due the first discovery of this Araucaria, in the 
little islands off Nis TR and subsequently on main island :— On one of the western small isles was an 
fire gone before night, and no more xem been seen after. They were still more positive that the elevations were 
pillars n Vids. like those which compose the Giants Causeway in Ireland.’ On nearing the island, a few days 
later, *every one was satisfied eft were trees, except our philosophers, who still maintained they were basaltes.' 
To the commander * they had mu of tall pines, which occasioned my giving that name to the island." 
* I was, however, determined not " sen the: eint till I knew what trees these were which had been the subject of our 
uite T as they appeared to be of a sort useful to visco and had not been seen anywhere but in the 
h of this land At length Capt. Cook landed, accompanied by the Botanists. * We found the tall trees to 
be a kind of Spruce Pine, very proper for spars, of which we were in want. We were now no longer at a loss to know 
of what trees the natives made their canoes. On this little isle were some which measured twenty inches diameter, and 
on the main and larger isles ; and if appearances did not deceive us, we can assert it. If I except New Zealand, I, at 
this time, knew of no island in the South Pacific Ocean where a ship could supply herself with a mast or a yard, were 
“ There cannot be a doubt that this resemblance to columns of basalt induced the elder Forster to call this tree 
Cupressus columnaris, though he has fallen into an error in considering the Norfolk Island Pine (Araucaria excelsa) to 
, nor 
found by the ‘ philosophers’ of Capt. d PAD but à fine apex of a branch and young cone were ciam home, 
and are preserved in the Banksian Her d fi in Mr. Lambert’s splendid work, under an impressi : 
the species was identieal with that of N onfolk, Island, and on o'r same plate with the perfect cone of the latter species 
La L 
ces ve 
think it only justice to the latter author to restore it to that particular species for which it was intended, and to which 
itis so very appropriate ; we would otherwise gladly have opo r. Brown's excellent one :—for assuredly nearly all 
the partieulars we know of this interesting Pine are derived from the narrative of the illustrious navigator. Sin 
enough, as Dr. Lindley quotes from Mr. Moore's letter, ‘the first tree of this, noticed by ti Cook (in 1774) as 
“elevated like a tower,” still stands (1850) and is in a flourishing condition. Its appearance now is exactly that of a well- 
proportioned factory chimney of great height. The species is no doubt equally tender with the Norfolk Island Pine.” 
The remarks on the nomenclature of plants made at p. 61 of the last number of this work explain why we cannot 
ireumstances 
which are said to justify this measure. The plant in question was supposed by Forster, the first botanist who saw 
it, to be a Cupressus, and he called it colwmnaris, which, had it been a Cypress, would have been a characteristic name. 
But it proved to have no claim to stand in ae genus where it was placed, and he afterwards published it as 
Dombeya columnaris, under which h ixed up the present plant and the Norfolk Island Pine, that there is no 
