BOTANY. 97 



The Californian white cedar [Lihocedfus decurrens) grows 

 one hundred feet high, and seven feet thick in the trunk. It 

 is found from Mount Shasta to the Tejon Pass. The trunk is 

 usually angular. Many of the trees are affected with a dry-rot 

 which destroys their vahie as timber. 



The fragrant-cedar ( Cupressus fragrans) is found along the 

 northern coast of the state. It is a large tree, and produces a 

 white, clear lumber, valuable for furniture and the inside work 

 of houses. The wood has a strong, lasting, and not unpleas- 

 ant odor, half way between turpentine and ottar of roses. 



Lawson's cedar [Cupressus lawsonianci) is a tree of little 

 value. 



The arbor-vitce, also called cedar {Thuja giganted)^\?> a most 

 symmetrical and graceful conifer, growing to be nearly three 

 hundred feet high. 



§ 71. Yew and Nutmeg. — The Western yew is an upright 

 tree, from fifty to seventy-five high, with thin and fight fofi- 

 age, the leaves being about an inch long. Its growth is 

 straighter, its branches fewer, and its foliage thinner, more 

 feathery, and lighter in color, than the European yew. It 

 grows on the Sierra Nevada from 34° northward to British 

 Columbia. 



The coast cypress ( Cupressus macro-carpus) is found only 

 on Cedar Point, at Monterey, and there are not more than one 

 hundred trees of it there. The foliage is very dense. 



The Californian n iriiie-r {Torre >j a calif or nica) is a graceful 

 and beautiful evergreen found in the Coast Mountains near the 

 bay of San Francisco. It grows from fifty to seventy-five feet 

 high, and resembles the Western yew in foHage and general 

 form. The fruit is like a nutmeg in size and shape, but it has 

 a disagreeable terebinthine taste, and is never used as a condi- 

 ment. 



§ 72. Laurel. — The Californian laurel, or bay {Oreodaphne 



callfornica)^ is one of the most common and beautiful trees of 



the coast valleys. It is an evergreen, which grows to a height 



of fifty feet, with a trunk sometimes thirty inches in diameter. 



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