VIl. 
PAPERS ON CONIFER. 
I. ON PINUS ARISTATA, 
A NEW SPECIES OF PINE, DISCOVERED BY DR. C. C. PARRY IN THE ALPINE REGIONS OF COLO- 
RADO TERRITORY, AND ON SOME OTHER PINES OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.* 
From THE TRANSACTIONS OF THE Sr. Louis ACADEMY OF ScIENCE, Vou. II. 1868. 
Dourine his first botanical expedition to the Pike’s Peak region, Dr. Parry, in searching [205] 
for James’ Pinus flexilis, found, instead of one, two five-leaved pines, which evidently had 
been confounded by Dr. James ; thus the discrepancies of his description are fully explained. His 
general description of the tree and the edible seeds belong to what we now name P. flexilis, while 
the “erect cones” (smaller than those of P. rigida) “with unarmed scales” must be either very 
imperfect young ones of this, or old ones of the new species, which had lost their awns. 
PINUS ARISTATA, spec. nov.:; arbor mediocris seu humilis; foliis dense congestis quinis uncialibus integris acu- 
tiusculis ex axillis perularum per plures annos persistentium, squamis vaginanti ibus obtusis mox patulis squarrosis 
demum totis deciduis; amentis masculis ovatis involucro 4~phyllo munitis in axilla bracter ovate acuminate persis- 
tentis stipitatis, antherarum crista ad umbonem parvulum singulum vel binos reducta; amentis femineis erectis 
herbaceo-echinatis atro purpureis ; strobilis ovatis horizontalibus violaceo-fuscis, squamarum elongato-cuneatarum apo- 
physi rhombea parum tumescente transverse carinata medio in umbone parvo breviter aristata ; seminibus ala ipsa 
oblique obovata duplo minoribus. 
On alpine heights, between 9,200 and 11,800 or 12,000 feet high, on Pike’s Peak and the high mountains of the 
Snowy Range, Dr. Parry, 1861 and 1862 ; Messrs Hall é& Harbour (Coll. No. 530), 1862. Also on the heights of the 
Coochetopa Pass, nearly 8S. W. of Pike’s Peak (altitude over 10,000 feet), where Capt. Gunnison discovered in 1853 
what seems to be this species without fruit (see Pac. R. R. Rep. II., p. 130) ; the leaves which I could compare are 
those of our plant. Flowers end of June and beginning of July. Flourishing best in the higher elevations and never 
descending below 9,000 feet, in its lower ranges not ripening its fruits as well as on the bleak heights, this truly alpine 
species — in that respect our representative of the European P. Pumilio— characterizes the highest belt of timber on 
the peaks of Colorado. On sheltered slopes a tree 40 or 50 feet high and 1~2 feet in diameter, it becomes a straggling 
bush, prostrate, and almost creeping, on the bleak summits of the high ridges. The bark is thin and scaly, even in 
older trees not more than 3 or 4 lines thick, of a light grayish-brown eolar that of younger branches smoot 
with many large vesicles containing a clear fluid balsam, which remains between the layers of the old bark. Wood [206] 
white, tough, not very resinous; of extremely slow growth, so that a small smooth-barked stem of 13 lines diam- 
eter exhibited about fifty annual rings, all between } and J, line wide, the smaller ones consisting of 3-6, the widest 
ones of 15-25 layers of cells, each cell 0.007 line in diameter. A tree of 2 feet thickness would at that rate indicate 
an age of over 1,000 years ; but the annual rings of larger trees growing in favored situations are wider, and, if a speci- 
men sent by Dr. Parry is not mislabelled, sometimes as wide as } line, giving the largest trees a probable age of 500- 
800 years. Branches spreading, very often many of them twisted, stunted, or dead ; the larger branches and the stem 
* For a German translation by Schlechtendal, see Flora, XX XIII. (XVII.) 383-394. — Eps. 
