1780 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



white poplar is often called abele in England, but this is the Dutch name, abee/, 1 of 

 P. canescens. The white poplar is known in Dutch and Belgian nurseries as peuplier 

 blanc de Hollande. 



The true white poplar has never become a common tree in England. Most of 

 the large trees known as white poplars that we have seen are P. canescens, and it is 

 impossible to separate the two species in Loudon's account of them. There are 

 three good trees of P. alba at Bayfordbury, Hertford, the largest of which was 95 ft. 

 by 10 ft. 4 in. in 191 1. Mr. J. E. Little of Crofton, Hitchin, who has kindly sent 

 specimens, tells me that between Norton Mill and Radwell Mill, near Baldock, Herts, 

 on the bank of the river Ivel, there are four large white poplars, about 80 feet in 

 height and 12 to 13 feet in girth. At Syston Park, Grantham, Miss F. H. Woolward, 

 in 1905, measured a tree 105 ft. by 10 ft. 10 in. In Ireland the finest are at 

 Adare Manor, where Mr. R. A. Phillips measured a tree 80 ft. by 9 ft. in 1910. 

 Another at Nenagh was 60 ft. by 5 ft. in 191 1. All these trees bear female flowers. 



Pynaert 2 saw in 1882, at Troyes in France, a true white poplar which measured 

 140 ft. in height and 21 ft. 3 in. in girth, at six and a half feet above the ground. It 

 divided at thirty-one feet up into three main stems, the largest of which girthed 

 14 ft. 9 in.; while the total spread of branches was 260 ft. in circumference. This 

 magnificent tree, which was supposed to be about 400 years old, was destroyed 8 by a 

 storm on 1st February, 1902. I saw, in 191 2, a fine tree in the botanic garden at 

 Toulouse, 90 ft. high by 8 ft. in girth. (A. H.) 



POPULUS CANESCENS, Grey Poplar 



Populus canescens, Smith, Fl. Brit. iii. 1080 (1805), and Eng. Flora, 245 (1828) ; Smith and Sowerby, 

 Eng. Bot. xxiii. t. 1619 (1806), and vii. 114, t 1392 (1840); Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. iii. 

 1639 (1838); Bromfield, in Phytologist, iii. 841 (1850); Schneider, Laubholzkunde, i. 23 

 (1904); Dode, in Mint. Soc. Hist. Nat. Autun, xviii. 26 (1905); Aigret, in Ann. Trav. Publ. 

 Belg. x. 1214 (1905). 



Populus alba, Linnaeus, var. /3,/oliis minoribus, Lamarck, Fl. Franc, ii. 235 (1778). 



Populus alba, Linnaeus, var. canescens, Aiton, Hort. Kew. iii. 405 (1789). 



Populus alba, Willdenow, Berl. Baumz. 227 (1796) (not Linnaeus) ; Hunter, in Evelyn, Silva, i. 208, 

 plate (1801); Smith, Eng. Bot. t. 1618 (excl. description) (1806). 



Populus alba, Linnaeus, var. genuina, Wesmael, in De Candolle, Prod. xvi. 2, p. 324 (1864). 



Populus alba, Linnaeus, var. typica, Gombocz, in Math. Termes. Kozl. xxx. 151 (1911). 



Populus megaleuce and alba, Dode, op. at. 24, 25 (1905). 



Populus hybrida, Reichenbach, Icon. Fl. Germ. xi. 29, t. 615 (1849) (not Bieberstein 4 ). 



Populus Steiniana, Bornmiiller, in Gartenfl. xxxvii. 173, figs. 37, 38 (1888). 



Populus Bachofenii, Reichenbach, Icon. Fl. Germ. xi. 29, t. 616 (1849) ( not Wierzbicki 8 ). 



1 Murray, New Eng. Diet. i. 15 (1888), says that the Dutch name corresponds to an old French word, abel, derived from 

 late Latin, albellus, a name given to the white poplar in the twelfth century. Worlidge, Syst. Agric. 96 (1681), speaks of 

 the abele tree as " a finer kind of white poplar." 



1 Bull. Arbor. Belg. 1882, p. 190. * Ibid. 1902, p. 72. 



4 Bieberstein, Fl. Tour. Cauc. K. 422 (1808), describes P. hybrida, a doubtful plant which, op. cit. iii. 633 (1819), he 

 abandons, as not being different from P. alba. A specimen, however, in the Cambridge Herbarium, labelled "P. hybrida, 

 M. B., Caucasus," is quite distinct from P. alba, and appears to be a form of P. canescens with orbicular leaves, sinuately 

 toothed, and glabrous beneath. It bears fruiting catkins 4 in. long. 



* P. Bachofenii, Wierzbicki, in Rochel, Banat. Reise, 77 (1838), is said by Gombocz, op. cit. 148, to be a form of P. 

 alba, var. nivea, and identical with P. heteroloba, Dode, authentic specimens of which I cannot distinguish from typical 

 P. alba, var. nivea. 



