LARIX OCCIDENTALIS 141 



to the naval constructor and the crew concerned in 

 the waterproof role it was relied upon to perform. 



L. OcciDENTALis. — Of this representative of our 

 American trio great things are expected. It is a 

 mighty tree in its own country, and some see in it 

 a mightier future even that that achieved by the 

 European utilitarian champions of our landed estates. 

 It was only introduced to Kew in 1881, and this 

 seems a distance of time to some of us advancing in 

 life such a very short time since. It has been tried, 

 among other places, at Brocklesbury (Lord Yar- 

 borough's), and written of in Arboricultural Journal 

 (191 2) as not found wanting, by such a capable judge 

 of the merits and demerits of tree life as Mr. Havelock. 



This Western Larch clearly reveals its individuality 

 by the long, bristle-like bracts that are exserted from 

 between the cone scales, and which point outwards, 

 protrusively and aggressively in contradistinction 

 to the other prominent rival in the field on this 

 particular point — the L. Griffithii, whose bracts 

 point upward. 



Of the medium-sized-cone competitors, the cones 

 of the Occidentalis may be estimated to rank as the 

 smallest. 



L. Lyalli. — If this distinguished stranger among 

 trees with us were momentarily permitted power 

 of speech, with some show of justice perhaps it 

 might prefer complaint in that no mention of it 

 was made as among those Larches famed for their 

 displays of exserted bracts. To which we, in admis- 

 sion of guilty plea, would make reply and urge that 

 it is so far a tree so very new, so very strange to us ; 

 and in humbly prajnng forgiveness for omission, 

 further urge that its coning days in England have not 



