VARIABILITY OF CONIFEROUS TREES 285 



North Wales, every link between the typical 

 P. Laricio and the so - called P. nigricans or 

 P. austriaca can be seen. How greatly different 

 trees of P. Strobus vary in length of foliage and 

 size of cone — a remark that applies with still 

 greater force to the Mexican P. Montezumce. P. 

 massoniana, and P. parviflora are other examples 

 of extreme variability, both in aspect and colour 

 of foliage. Specimens of these, growing near the 

 shores of Lough Neagh, in Ireland, are as widely 

 different from what one sees in the English parks 

 as could well be imagined. 



To see Abies Pinsapo growing on chalk at High 

 Elms, in Kent, or Tsuga canadensis by the margins 

 of the Drakelow Lakes at Woburn Abbey, their 

 identification with other specimens of the same 

 species, as usually seen, would be a by no means 

 easy task for the amateur. No one, even an 

 expert, would readily reconcile two specimens of 

 Juniper us communis collected from one of the 

 Hertfordshire or Kentish commons. Whether in 

 habit, shape, length of leaves, or general foliage 

 tint, different specimens would appear to be widely 

 separated and hardly recognisable unless by the 

 person who studied them on their native downs. 

 But amongst all coniferous trees none would 

 appear to vary more than the familiar Cupressus 

 Lawsoniana. I have often noticed in a bed of 

 these plants raised from seeds collected from one 

 and the same tree that the variability in general 

 character is truly remarkable. Some are strict 

 and others of decidedly pendulous growth, some 

 are of a dark sombre green as compared with the 

 silvery hue of others, while some are giants and 



