DROPMORE. 53& 



dykes in the great galleries, which irradiate whole acres of com- 

 mon art. 



The oldest and finest portion of the Pinetum occupies a lawn of 

 several acres near the house, upon which are assembled, like 'belles 

 at a levee, many of those loveliest of evergreens the araucaria or 

 pine of Chili, the Douglass' fir of California, the sacred cedar of 

 India, the funcebral cypress of Japan, and many others. 



Perhaps the finest tree in this scene is the Douglass' fir (Abies 

 Douglassii). It is sixty-two feet high, and has grown to this alti- 

 tude in twenty-one years from the seed. It resembles most the 

 Norway spruce, as one occasionally sees the finest form of that tree, 

 having that graceful downward sweep of the branches and feathering 

 out quite down to the turf but it is altogether more airy in form 

 and of a richer and darker green in color. At this size it is the 

 symbol of stately elegance. Here is also a specimen, thirty feet 

 high, of Pinus insignis, the richest and darkest of all pines, as well 

 as Pinus excelsa, one of the most affectedly pretty evergreens its 

 silvery leaves resembling those of the white pine, but drooping lan- 

 guidly and Pinus macrocarpa with longer leaves than those of 

 the pinaster.* 



But the gem of the collection is the superb Chili pine or arau- 

 caria the oldest, I think, in England, or, at all events, the finest. 

 The seed was presented to the late Lord Grenville by William IVth 

 who had some of the first gigantic cones of this tree that were 

 imported. This specimen is now thirty feet high, perfectly symme- 

 trical, the stem as straight as a column the branches disposed 

 with the utmost regularity, and the lower ones drooping and 

 touching the ground like those of a larch. If you will not smile, I 

 will tell you that it struck me that the expression of this tree is 

 heroic that is, it looks the very Mars of evergreens. There are no 

 slender twigs, no small branches but a great stem with branches 

 like a colossal bronze candelabrum, or perhaps the whole reminds 

 one more of some gigantic, dark green coral than a living, flexible 



* Taxodium sempervirena is here seventeen feet high rich dark green in 

 foliage and very ornamental. Oryptomeria japonica, nearly as large, rather 

 disappointed me keeping its brown leaves so long as to disfigure the plant 

 somewhat. Picea nobilis is a truly beautiful fir tree. 



