192 ESSAYS. 



of the district knew it by the name of " Stinking Cedar " or 

 " Savine " — the unsavory adjective referring to a peculiar 

 unpleasant smell which the wounded bark exhales. The tim- 

 ber is valued for fence-posts and the like, and is said to be 

 as durable as red cedar. I may add that, in consequence of 

 the stir we made about it, the people are learning to call it 

 Torreya. They are proud of having a tree which, as they 

 have rightly been told, grows nowhere else in the world. 



My desire for a sight of it was soon gratified. Making our 

 way into the woods north of the railroad track, along the 

 ridges covered with a mixed growth of Pines and deciduous 

 trees, I soon discerned a thrifty young Torreya, and after- 

 wards several of larger size, some of them with male flowers 

 just developed. 



As we approached the first one, I told my companion that 

 I expected to find under its shade a peculiar low herb, which 

 I described, but had never yet seen growing wild. And there, 

 indeed, it was, — greatly to the wonderment of my companion 

 — the botanically curious little Croomia pauciflora, just as it 

 was found by Mr. Croom, when he also discovered the tree, 

 nearly forty years ago, probably at a station several miles 

 farther south. I was a pupil and assistant of the lamented 

 Torrey when Mr. Croom brought to him specimens, both of 

 the tree and of the berb, both new genera. The former, as I 

 have stated, was named for Dr. Torrey by his correspondent 

 Arnott. The latter was dedicated to its discoverer by Dr. 

 Torrey. I well remember Mr. Croom's remark upon the oc- 

 casion, that if his name was deemed worthy of botanical 

 honors, it was gratifying to him, and becoming to the circum- 

 stances, that it should be borne by the unpretending herb 

 which delighted to shelter itself under the noble Torreya. It 

 is not, as Mr. Croom then supposed, exclusively so found ; 

 for it grows also in the central and upper portions of Alabama 

 and Georgia, where Torreya is unknown, but where I fancy 

 it may once have flourished. I cannot here detail the reasons 

 for this supposition. 



There is a second Torreya in Japan, founded on Thunberg's 

 Taxus nucifera, of which I saw original specimens at the 



