80 EESOUKCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



some of its cones, leaves, and wood, to botanists in New Yori, 

 but they were unfortunately lost on the way. A few months 

 later, an English collector sent some specimens to Professor 

 Lindley, who not only found the tree to be of a new species, 

 but determined to make a new genus of it, and he affixed to it 

 the name Wellingto?iia glgcmtea. When the news of the se- 

 lection of tliis name arrived in California, a foolish and preten- 

 tious fellow, who meddled with matters of science of which he 

 knew nothing, wrote a ranting article against Lindley, for try- 

 ing to confer the honor of the great tree of America upon a 

 Briton like Wellington, and declaring that the only proper 

 title for the tree would be Washingtonia gigantea. If there 

 had been any bad taste in conferring the name of a Tory and 

 a man of blood upon such a magnificent tree, still the rules of 

 botanical nomenclature are well estabhshed, and the matter of 

 the name is left entirely to the discretion of the man who first 

 gives a technical description of the plant and determines its 

 genus. American botanists, therefore, never recognized the 

 name Washingt07iia^ because Lindley's name w^as of undoubt- 

 ed priority ; and to acknowledge the priority, and yet recognize 

 the Washingtonia, would be equivalent to proving their own 

 stupidity. And yet English botanists have, in scientific rec- 

 ords, accused American botanists and "Americans" of making 

 an agitation to establish the name as Washingtonia. These 

 facts are part of the history of botany, and facts of interest 

 relating to the big trees. 



The general opinion among botanists is, that Lindley was 

 wrong in declaring the mammoth tree to be of a new genus: 

 it is a /Sequoia., related in the closest manner to the redwood. 

 "When the redwood and the mammoth tree come to be held 

 as of a distinct genera, then nearly every difference heretofore 

 considered merely specific may be made the basis for establish- 

 ing new genera. Dr. Seeman called the mammoth tree the 

 /Sequoia gigantea^ and it bears that name with botanists gen- 

 erally. 



The /Sequoias are found only in California; the Sequoia 



