p. INSIGNIS, P. PATULA 41 



P. Radiata or Insignis. — In spite of the contested 

 nature of its name, this Pine from Monterey has been 

 and will be, I strongly suspect, to most alive of over 

 twenty years of age now, still known and made 

 allusion to by its old name of P. Insignis. By that 

 name we have known it, by that name where it grows 

 in plenty it has been always familiarly greeted on 

 sight. If we have been wrong in calling it Insignis, 

 we have many of us been wrong through a long er- 

 roneous life, and now is too late in the day to change 

 our habits and call it by any other name. Old friends 

 cannot be expected to find anything welcome or 

 irradiating in the change. Of such commanding 

 strength is force of habit 1 It requires something even 

 more compelling than royal decree or stroke of pen 

 to change such a wddely established nomenclature. 



The Insignis is a tree that undoubtedly favours 

 sea air, and growls at its best on our w^armer coast 

 lines ; at the same time it can flourish, and has flour- 

 ished, in some more Midland situations, and often it 

 has been observed best, despite a saltless influence, 

 in the more humid environment of lakes and ponds. 



One tribute more must we pay to this so-called 

 " remarkable Pine," and it is this, that where it 

 succeeds it seems to luxuriate in the most superabund- 

 ant and brilliant wealth of grass-green effects of colour, 

 and to look as if it absolutel}^ revelled in an irradiating 

 glow of health, strength, and vitality. In this, its 

 state of prime perfection, we may well say of it, in 

 Old Testament metaphor, " that its glory covers 

 the heavens, and that the earth is full of its praise." 



P. Patula. — 



And their delectable things shall not profit, but they are their own 

 witnesses . — I s ai ah . 



The p. Patula may be looked upon as the analogue 

 of the long-leaved Himalayan P. Longifolia, to which 



