APPENDIX C. 135 



16th and 15th centuries,* and others somewhat 

 confusedly (' assez confinement') of the 14th ; 

 years having effaced, or filled up the greater 

 part of the characters. These were probably 

 the same trees which Thevet mentions having 

 seen in those islands, in his voyage to the Ant- 

 arctic Seas in 1555 (in which, however, no no- 

 tice is taken either of the size of the trees, 

 or of inscriptions on them). These characters 

 were six inches at the utmost in length, and not 

 so much as two feet in width, being about the 

 eighth part of the circumference of the trunk, 

 from which Adanson concluded that they had 

 not been cut while the trees were young. Neg- 

 lecting the date of the 14th century, and taking 

 that of the 15th, which is very distinct, he holds 

 it to be evident that, if these trees have been 

 two centuries in gaining six feet in diameter, 

 they would be at least eight in acquiring twenty- 

 five feet. But experience teaches that trees 

 grow rapidly at first, afterwards more slowly, 

 and finally cease to increase in diameter, when 

 the tree has attained the size usual to its spe- 

 cies. Adanson knew from observation, that the 



* It seems clear that Adanson in speaking of the 14th, 

 loth, and 16th centuries, really means the 15th, 16th, 

 and 17th, inasmuch as he in one place carefully reckons 

 from the date of the 15th century to the year 1749, as a 

 period of two centuries. 



