PlNUS MONOPHYLLA SiNGLE-LEAF PlNON PlNE. 55 



here and in the Holy Land. " This is an error. The tree in the Holy 

 Land to which reference is made in this statement is the Cedar of 

 Lebanon (Cedrus Libani), very different, of course, from the Cypress 

 botanically, though its habit of growth is so similar to that of the flat- 

 topped Cypress trees of Cypress Point that it has given rise to the 

 popular belief, among people not particularly versed in trees, that 

 they are the same. 



GENUS PINUS, TOURNEFORT. 



Leaves evergreen, needle-shaped, from slender buds, in clusters of 2-5 together, 

 each cluster invested at its base with a sheath of thin, membranous scales. Flowers 

 appearing in spring, monoecious. Sterile flowers in catkins, clustered at the base 

 of the shoots of the season ; stamens numerous with very short filaments and a 

 scale-like connective ; anther cells, 2, opening lengthwise ; pollen grains triple. 

 Fertile flowers in conical or cylindrical spikes cones consisting of imbricated, 

 carpellary scales, each in the axil of a persistent bract and bearing at its base 

 within a pair of inverted ovules. Fruit maturing in the autumn of the second 

 year, a cone formed of the imbricated carpellary scales, which are woody, often 

 thickened or awned at the apex, persistent, when ripe, dry and spreading to 

 liberate the two nut-like and usually winged seeds ; cotyledons 3-12, linear. 



(Pinus is a Latin word from Celtic pin or pen, a crag.) 



196. PINUS MONOPHYLLA, TORR. 

 SINGLE-LEAF PINON PINE, NUT PINE, PINON. 



Ger., Einzujblattrige Fichte ; Fr., Pin monofeuillier ; Sp., Pino 



de sola hoja. 



SPECIFIC CHARACTERS .: Leaves solitary, terete, from 1 to 2| in. long (occa- 

 sionally in 2-leaved fascicles and semi- terete) stout, rigid, incurved and spine-like, 

 with sharp callous tips, pale glaucous-green, with 18 to 26 rows of stomata, 2 to 

 several resin ducts and a single central fibro-vascular bundle, sheathes with short 

 and reflexed scales which soon fall away leaving thin persistent bases. Staminate 

 flowers oval, about in. long, dark red, usually surrounded by 6 involucral 

 bracts ; anthers terminating in minute knobs or teeth. Pistillate flowers oval, 

 lateral, with thick apiculate scales and raised on short thick peduncles which are 

 surrounded by about half a dozen involucral bracts. Fruit stout, ovoid, bright 

 green cones, li to 2| in. long and of nearly the same thickness with few 

 scales (the central ones only bearing fertile seeds), rounded at apex, f- in. across 

 or less, the thick, exposed portion being four-angled and bearing a prominent 

 truncate or concave umbo. After maturity the cones open widely and are of a 

 lustrous light yellowish brown color ; seeds edible, falling away from the light 

 brown wings "which remain attached to the scales, compressed, dark reddish 

 brown oblong, about f in. or less in length, pointed at apex, rounded at base, 

 mottled yellowish brown, spotted with purple, with thin brittle shell, oily albu- 

 men and embryo with 7-10 cotyledons. 



(The specific name is from the Greek povos, solitary, and <j>v\Xov, leaf. ) 



A small tree, with low rounded or irregularly wide pyramidal top, 

 with long crooked lower branches, almost resting on the ground. I 

 have seen it some over 30 ft. (9 m.) in height, but generally it is 

 considerably less, with short trunk, rarely over 18 in. (0.-15 m.) in 

 diameter, covered with a rather thin light-brown bark, with broad 



