PINUS THUNBERGI. 385 



Pinus Thunberyi is planted everywhere throughout Japan and, for 

 every conceivable purpose, for it will grow in the poorest as well as 

 in the best soils ; it is used as a shelter- tree on the sea-coast for 

 the protection of the cultivated lands against the high winds blowing 

 from the ocean ; for the fixation of sand dunes in the same way as 

 P. Pinaster is used in the French Landes ; it is planted in avenues 

 .along the public highways for hundreds of miles, often in conjunction 

 with P. densiflora; it -is also planted on exhausted lands unfit for 

 other crops for the sake of its wood which supplies the fuel of many 

 of the poorer inhabitants. But it is in its relation to horticulture and 

 to the social and religious life of the Japanese that P. Thunbergi 

 associated with P. densiflora is seen in its most interesting aspects, 

 for it is found in every garden, in every temple enclosure and in 

 every cemetery. As Siebold remarked long ago "the art of the 

 Japanese gardener has exhausted itself in the cultivation of these 

 Pines ; they are clipped and cut in all manner of ways ; the branches 

 'are spread out like a fan upon horizontal espaliers to give them the 

 form of a flat table. In this artificial cultivation, extremes meet, 

 surprise is equally sought to be gained by specimens of immense 

 extent as by others reduced to the smallest possible dimensions."* 

 During Dr. Siebold's stay at Osaka he went to see the celebrated Pine 

 in front of the Naniwaja Tea-house, of which the branches artificially 

 extended have a circuit of 135 paces. Another remarkable specimen 

 was seen by Mr. Maries in 1878 and fifteen years later by Mr. James 

 H. Veitch in the village of Karasaki about three miles from Lake 

 Biwa-Ko ; it is one of the most curious Pines in Japan ; the height 

 is about 50 feet, the circumference of the trunk at the base is 

 20 feet, but at a few feet from the ground owing to trifurcation it 

 is 37 feet ; the spread of branches from east to west is 240 feet, 

 and from north to south 288 feet ; the principal branches are held 

 up by numerous supports both of wood and stone ; old wouncls caused 

 by time and decay have been stopped by plaster, and over one 

 particularly bad spot a small roof has been erected. 



But more extraordinary still is the Pine trained in the form of a 



junk, standing in the garden attached to the monastery at Kinkakuja ; 



its present shape is, according to the resident priests, the result of 



over three centuries of patient labour. The trunk forms the mast, and 



two opposite branches springing from it at a few inches from the 



ground have been made the basis on which the structure of the hull 



has been worked out ; this is 35 feet in length and somewhat exceeds 



the height of the tree. The remaining branches of the trunk are bare 



from 12 to 18 inches from their base, and the branchlets beyond have 



been trained in continuous spirals so that the youngest shoots with 



their foliage now rest upon thick layers of twisted, interlaced, stiffened 



wood, the accumulated training of a long series of years.f 



Pinus Thunbergi was introduced into Europe by Siebold in 1855, 



and into Great Britain with P. densiflora by the late John Gould 



Veitch in 1861. Unfortunately it was distributed both by Siebold 



* Flora Japonica, Vol. II. p. 26. 



t Whether this marvellous instance of oriental patience is Pinus Thunbergi or 

 P. densiflora is somewhat uncertain ; the more slender and flexible branchlets of the latter 

 would seem to lend themselves to this kind of training with greater facility than the 

 stouter, stiffer shoots of P. Thunbergi. 



CO 



