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CHAPTER XL 



plant a few of these trees at one end of my garden to 

 give shade ; but the gardener, an honest and good- 

 hearted old man, begged me not to meddle with them. 

 " You will suffer," he said, " if you plant a Cypress." 

 Thinking that he was afraid on his own account, I 

 asked him to dig them up and bring them : I would 

 plant them myself. I might as well have begged 

 him to bring a tiger, and let it loose in the garden ! 



According to Professor Penzig the true type of 

 Cypress is that with branches spreading horizontally. 



The Ailantus (Fig. 104) is one of 

 the commonest roadside trees in this 

 district. It spreads in all directions 

 by suckers, and I believe that the 

 seeds also ripen. The Chinese name is 

 " Tree of Heaven." The Ailantus be- 

 longs to a tropical order which has but 

 one representative in the Mediterranean 

 region ; namely, the little Cneorum 

 (Fig. 33), sometimes called Mediter- 

 ranean Quassia, a shrub which grows 

 on the hills to the east of Nice. The 

 Ailantus is easily known by its long 

 deciduous pinnate leaves : there are 

 as many as fourteen pairs of leaflets 

 on one of these. The leaflets show a 

 tendency to be pinnatifid. The tree is seen at its 

 best when the clusters of winged fruits turn red. 



The chaplain at Carabacel asked me the name of 

 a tree which kept the sun from his window. I told 

 him that it was the " Tree of Heaven," most appro- 

 priate to shade the dwelling of a " Man of God " ; if 

 a " Bird of Paradise " would only build its nest in 



Fig. 33. CXEORVM 



TKICOCCON. 



