Illustrations of Conifers. 63 



TORREYA TAXIFOLIA (Arnott). Stinking Cedar. 



Am. Nat. Hist. I. 130 (1838), with fig. 



Gardeners' Chronicle, Vol. IV, New Series, p. '291 (1875). 



Veitch's Man. Conif. ed. 2, p. 119 (1900). 



Trees of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. VI. p. 14G6 (1912). 



A tree attaining in Florida a height of 40 feet, and a girth of 

 3 to 6 feet. Branches spreading, slightly pendulous, forming an 

 open pyramidal head. Bark about inch thick, irregularly fissured 

 and scaly. Young branchlets bright green and glabrous, becoming 

 dark yellowish-red when older. Buds ovoid, J to \ inch long, with 

 ovate sharp-pointed shining scales. 



Leaves linear, spreading at right angles to the branchlet in a 

 two-ranked arrangement, linear, nearly straight, 1 to 1J inch long, 

 sharp-pointed, dark green and shining above, rounded at the base, 

 shortly stalked ; lower surface with two pale stomatic bands in shal- 

 low grooves. The foliage has a very disagreeable smell. 



Staminate flowers sub-globose, } inch long, crowded in the axils 

 of the upper leaves. Fruit globose or ovoid, about 1 inch long, 

 dark purple, with a thin light brown shell. 



Torreya taxifolia is only known as a wild tree in the region 

 bordering the Appalachicola river in Gadsden County, Florida, where 

 it grows on limestone soil and in river swamps. It was discovered 

 by Mr. H. C. Croom in 1833. It is not in cultivation in the British 

 Isles. 



The illustration represents a specimen collected in Florida, 

 in 1900, by Mr. A. H. Curtiss, and photographed at the British 

 Museum Herbarium. 



