THE GENESEE FARMER. 



315 



tions to the depth of 2000 feet. In the forest below 

 everything appears cahn and tranquil ; scarcely the 

 Bound of an auimal is heard; sometimes a few butter- 

 flies and beetles meet the eye, but not a house or a 

 human being is seen. On the sandy tracts near the 

 nvers, the lion or puma is frequently to be met with; 

 but this animal is perfectly harmless if not attacked." 

 It is from this wild and uninhabited country that 

 many of the fine plants raised by Messrs. Veitch were 



from this elevation to the perpetual snows, where it is 

 not more than 4 inches in height. With these grow 

 the \ ews (Saxc-Gothmt and Poducarpus nubigcna), 

 whicu are beautiful evergreen trees, and, as well aa 

 the others, afford excellent timber." 



Saxe-Gothaia may be described as a genus with 

 the male flowers of a Podocarp, the females of a 

 i)ammar, the fruit of a Juniper, the seed of a Dacry- 

 dium, and the habit of a Yew. Its fleshy fruit, com- 



PUUCTIFICATION OP SAXE-GOTH^A. 



obtained, and among them the Saxe-Gothaa, Podo- 

 M.'-pus nubifrena, Fitz-Roya Paiagonica, and Libo- 

 tednis tetragona. Of these he writes thus: 

 ' The two last (Fitz-Roya and Libocedrus) I never 

 .w below the snow line. The former inhabits the 

 rocky precipices, and the latter the swampy places 

 letween the mountains. The first grows to an euor- 

 oous size, particularly about the winter snow line, 

 ffhere I have seen trees upward of 100 feet high, and 

 more than eight feet in diameter. It may be traced 



posed of consolidated scales, enclosing nut-like seed, 

 and forming what is technically called a Oalbulus, 

 places it near Juniperus, from which it more especially 

 differs in its anthers not being peltate, nor its fiuit 

 composed of a single Mhorl of perfect scales, and its 

 ovule having two integuments instead of one. In 

 the last respect it approaches! Podocarpus, and es- 

 pecially Dacrydium ; but the exterior integument of 

 the seed is a ragged abortive membrane, eveloping 

 the base only of the seed, instead of a well-defined 



