THE LONGEVITY OF TREES. 83 



The Talipot Palm, which blossoms but once, and then per- 

 ishes, — or the Century plant, which continues in our conser- 

 vatories even for a hundred years without flowering, but dies 

 when it has ripened its fruit, — may be adduced as cases of 

 death by old age. But in its native climes, where our so- 

 called Century-plant blossoms in the fifth or sixth year of its 

 age, it as uniformly dies immediately afterwards. The result, 

 in all such cases, is rather analogous to death from parturi- 

 tion, than to death by old age. 



This doctrine of the indefinite longevity of trees — that 

 they die from injury or disease, or, in one word, from acci- 

 dents, but never really from old age — was first propounded 

 by the distinguished De Candolle in one of his earliest writ- 

 ings, 1 near the commencement of the present century. It is 

 entirely a modern doctrine (unless, indeed, we may suppose 

 that Pliny comprehended the full meaning of his words, 

 " Vites sine fine crescunt," which is improbable), and it is by 

 no means surprising that it should have been received with 

 incredulity, or vehemently controverted, by those who had 

 not taken the pains to understand it. For the a priori con- 

 siderations, from which the young Genevan botanist deduced 

 his novel theory, were then, in truth, more or less hypotheti- 

 cal, and involved some hardy assumptions. They are now, 

 however, amply confirmed, or at least so generally admitted 

 by all vegetable physiologists, as to give the theory a high 

 degree of antecedent probability. But De Candolle proceeded 

 to indicate a mode in which its correctness might almost be 

 tested by actual observation, and, having accumulated a great 

 number of interesting data, he published, in 1831, the memoir 2 

 which, having been still further augmented, now constitutes 

 one of the most interesting chapters of his masterly " Physio- 

 logic Vegetale." 



If this view be well founded, it is to be expected that dif- 

 ferent individuals of the same species should perish at very ir- 

 regular periods ; and that some should be found to escape all 



1 " Flore Francaise," 1, p. 223. 



2 " Notice sur la Longevite des Arbres." Par Aug. Pyr. De Candolle, in 

 the Bibliotheque Universelle, May, 1831. 



