B-l 



THE GARDBNKRS' CHRONICLE. 



[Feb. lo, 





P 



aTwkich formed th# b**i» o 

 Hon, was not from the famous Wellingtonw, bat 

 from a Sec^u i ttmfwrv trees growing much Msrer 



Sin Francisco. . . 



" 9 i Dr Toaa*T ha* now had an opportunity ot 



counting the whole of the layers on a complete 

 nalimot a trunk of the W ellingtonta, and he finds 



y are onlv 1 120, not 3000 in number. 



u fa proof of the fallacy (which has of late years 

 been occasionally alluded to) of calculating the 

 number of rings in a tree by counting those of a 



Ertion of the radius, and of estimating the remain 

 r by measurement, D. Torret gives the following 

 data on the rate of growth of the Wellingtonia : 

 The Ut 100 layers occupied 17 h inches. 

 2 



to this add 403— the heads 



ormer calcula- 360 years old in 1410; 



number of years that intervened between 1410 and 



1813, when it was blown down, and we shall obtain 



It was, no doubt, much 



in large loose long 



11 



a total age of 763 years. 

 older,* and there is no physical reason why, if a 

 tree can grow for 763 years, it should not, in the 

 absence of accidents, acquire four times as great 



»r is it necessary to limit to Wellingtons the evi- 

 dence of trees having actually enjoyed a prodigious 



of Montezuma, in 



3d 

 4th 



h 

 6th 



ji 



*» 



m 

 tt 



n 



I 



8th 

 9th 



10th 



nth 



Remaining 80 lay 







M 



it 



■ 



ft 



it 



it 

 tt 



it 

 it 



a 

 tt 



it 

 Jt 



135 inches, or 1 1 feet 

 the trunk. 



1 1 20 layers occupied 



3 inches, the semi-diameter of 



• In illustration ol the still greater fallacy of 

 calculating the age of a tree from the thickness of 

 its stem, without even knowing the rate of growth 



arose e fabulous estimates 



I 



longevity. The so-called Cyp 

 the garden of Chapnltepec ( Mexico) measured, not 

 many years ago, forty-one feet (English) in circum- 

 ference ; but it dwindled to nothing before the 

 gigantic trunk of a Taxodium near Santa Maria de 

 Tesla, in the province of Oaxaca, which was first 

 mentioned by Kxtbr, who found its circumference to 

 be 117.10 feet (French). Da Candollb thought 



hat, in this case, either several trees might have 

 grown together, or that the measurement had been 

 taken round the dilated base of the trunk; but 

 Zcccartki assures us that Baron Von Karwinski 

 twic measured this tree, and sent him a drawing of 

 it, which enabled him to remove all such doubts. 

 11 The measurement, 1 ' he says, " was always taken 

 above the dilatation, and on each occasion the girth 



.vas found somewhat to exceed 1 L7 feet. The dilated 

 base wf not measured, but from the drawing it must 

 have a circumference of at least 200 feet, and thus 

 the diameter of the trunk must be about 39 

 feet, .iikI of the enlarged base about GO. 5 feet. The 

 dilated base surrou Is th«' whole trunk equally, so 



that it cannot readilv be supposed that the size is 



Now, if 



owing to the accretion of several trunks'. 

 we take as a basi for computation the statement of 

 Michai . given by Dr Candolle, that the most 

 thriving specimen of the tree in France attained 

 in 46 years a diameter of 1 foot, or 144 lines, and 

 j cot uently, that nnual ringa were formed of the 



and supposing a similar 



of any part of it t wh» 



of the age of the Adansoni-i, 1 may mention that 

 1 lately coui • i the ring-; corresponding to the 

 known age of a Huercus |>»dunculata of < years of 

 age, which had the very same diameter as other 



rtea of the tamo species growing within a few 

 miles of it, with between ll»> and IS ings, 



u he Wellington!;* remains, however, the oldest I thickness of 3*2 lines, 

 tree in a state ol health whose age has been ascer- \ increase of wood to occur up to the most recent 

 tamed, and 1120 years is no mean age, although 

 I believe some of the stunted, battered, half- rotten, 

 but ever re-shooting up < Hives of the Mediterraneai 

 to be much older than that." 



More than 20 years ago the writer of the present 

 article pointed out (Introduction to Botany), in the 

 following observations upon the growth of exogenous 

 trees, how great are the errors to which Ds <\n- 

 doli.f method of computing age is liable. 

 u With regard to juch >g of the age of a tree by the 



nspection of a fagiw r , the diameter of the stem 

 being known, a little reflection will show that this 



eriod of growth, it would appear that the trunk in 

 • mention, which has a diameter of 5352 lines, would 



he 1672 



This supposition, however, is 



of the 



ye ^ old. 

 rather improbable, since perhaps none 

 Conifers in the latter periods of their growth ever 

 deposit so much as 128 lines of wood within four 

 years. If, again, we assume the annual increase to 

 average only one line, we get 5332 rings, and, conse- 

 quently, that number of years is the age of the tree ; 

 but if we take the mean of these two numbers, we 

 should arrive at 8512 as the most probable number 

 of vears of age, and at an annual addition of ligneous 

 is to be din with great caution, and that it is liable | rings of 1.6 lines in thickness, which is sufficiently 



considerable." (Raj/ Pa/^rs, 1846, p. 21.) 



Al\ this is however conjectural in the absence of an 

 actual counting of the rings ; as is the ape of the great 

 Brazilian Leguminous trees found by Von Martius, 



to excessive error. If, indeed, the zones upon both 

 sides of a tree were always of the same, or nearl 

 the same thickness, much error would, perhaps, not 

 attend such an investigati i; but it happens that 

 from varioi causes, there is often a great difference 

 between the growth of the two sides, and con- 

 ■eqwmtly, that a fragment taken from either side 

 must necessarily lead to the falsest inferences. For 

 example, 1 K*ve now before me four specimen* of wood 

 taken almost sx hazard. The measurements of either 

 sid and their age, i» indicated by the number of 

 zones the comprehend, ar« as follows : — 



rfcntbamiA fratf frra 



Pvrus fr 



% *.. 



Diameter of 

 Side A. I Side B. 



Total 



J) lines 

 11 



A inns napalensb I n 



n 



n 



i.i.,i 



'5 lines' 4> lines 



20 



»> 



t 

 34 



•• 





Real A 



07 timber 

 of Zones. 



40 

 36 

 17 



8 







" Now, in the first of these 



s, suppose that a 

 portion of the side A were examined, the observer 

 would find that each zone is 0.225 of a line deep 

 and, as the whole diameter of the stem is 45 line 

 he ould estimate the side he examined to be 5 

 lines deep; consequently, he would arrive, by cal- 

 culation, at tin tn< ision that, as his plant was one 

 year growing 225 of I line, it would be 100 years 

 in growing 22.5 lines, while, in fact, it has been 

 only i years. And so of the rest." 



The statements of Dr. Torrev as above given 

 from Si!liman % s Journal, confirm in every par- 

 ticular the justice of the foregoing remarks. Never- 

 theless, we are still at liberty to beli 



and computed by one calculator to be 4000 years old, 

 while another, employing a different mode of estima- 

 tion, could not reduce it below 2052 years. But these 

 were pygmies by the side of the Taxodium of Tesla. 

 These remarks do not diminish our interest in 

 Wellingtonia ; they only reduce fabulous history 

 within the limit of fact, itself sufficiently surprising, 

 and show that, colossal as are the dimensions of 

 " the great tree," they are equalled by other trees 

 concerning which there is no room for doubt. 



■ 



Advices from Shanghai, of Nov. 18, inform us 

 that Mr. Fortune had just returned from the Tea 

 districts in Che-Kiantj, with another large collection 

 of seeds and plants for the East India Company. 

 It appears, from a report from Dr. Jamieson, that 



B3. s 92 Tea plants had reached the Himalayas in 



good condition, along with 178 healthy seedlu s of 

 the Chinese Chesnut (a species of Castanea), 628 

 plants of the Hemp Palm, several grafted specimens 

 of the Yang-mae, or eatable Myrica, and various 

 other plants. Among the latter is the true green 

 Indigo (so called) a . plant hitherto so little known 

 that it has been supposed to be Sophora japonica, 

 the dye of which is, we understand, yellow, not 

 green. Our letters do not say what the green 

 indigo really is, but we shall probably learn ere 

 long. 



are still at liberty to believe in the 

 possibility of trees living to the age of 3000 years 

 and more, although we have no positive proof that 

 they have actually done so. In the garden of the 

 late bir Robert Vaughn, at Nannan, in Merioneth- 

 shire there once existed a gigantic Oak, which was 

 »id by tradition to have been the very tree in which 

 Owen GLvrowR confined the 



New Plants. 



U2«J5enecio mikanioi des, Otto. Wulperf Mepertorium , 

 vi. 2(J4; alius Mikania senecioides of Gardens ; alias 

 Delairea odorata, Lemairc Hortic. univ., May 1844 ; 

 alias Breonia palmata of Belgian Gardens. 

 This plant having been made the subject of a communi- 

 cation in the last number of the « Revue Horticole " 

 and being almost unknown with u?, the following notes 

 upon it may prove useful. It is a climbing greenhouse 

 shrub from the Cape of Good Hope, suited for pur- 

 poses such as those to winch Lophospcrmum is applied. 

 The leaves are deeply cordate and angular. The flower 



• There i an apocryphal str of an l)ak tree having been 

 ,. — - „ „ «nm*- fell€d itt the Ardem • within, whoas trunk were found coins 



diameter in W years, it must in that case have been •i truc r m ye ? rH ] n V he ( Z U m of Romp - That tree ™s, 



, c . A , . — Welch chieftain, 



owel Sale taken prisoner bv him in the time of 

 Hbnry I\ . Let us suppose this tree, which was of 

 course hollow to have been only 3 feet in diameter 

 m 1410 (and it could not have been less, and was 



growth of old Oak trees to be 1 inch of semi- 





therefore, estimated to have been 3600 years ol 



appear in jarge juuse ivug stalkea axnuT 



corymbs ; are yellow and sweet-scented, but havingZ 

 ray want breadth of colour. According to M. VetU 

 of Orleans, its cuttings should be struck in heat i£ 

 February or March, put into small pots as soon as thet 

 have struck, and planted out in May, when they imme- 

 diately push vigorously ; with us June should be md 

 for May. Last year 10 plants were employed to cote* 

 a paling (barriere) 36 feet long and 4 feet wide ; they 

 were repeatedly stopped to make them throw ^ 

 laterals, and in three months they had covered the 

 space. The plant may also be pegged down, and made 

 to cover slopes and beds with verdure. It will not 

 however, flower out of doors, even at Orleans, but mmt 

 be brought into the greenhouse in the autumn. The 

 flowers, which smell like Heliotrope, will then open in 

 December and January. The plant, though only 4 

 climbing Groundsel, seems to be worth growing f or 

 winter decoration. 



VEGETABLE PATHOLOGY.— No. LVIII. 



264. Apostaxis.* Distillation. — Under this denomim. 

 tion it is proposed to consider all abnormal emission! 

 of nutritive or secreted fluids. The circumstances under 

 which the phenomena take place may be very various, 

 and the consequences of more or less gravity, according 

 as they are temporary or chronic, or may be compli- 

 cated with other diseased action. 



265. Apostaxis (Constitutional and'^ Functional), 

 Weepiso. — The nutriment of plants is received from 

 the ground, in-the form of a very attenuated solution, 

 which in its progress through the system levies contri- 

 buttons from matter previously assimilated ; insomuch, 

 that when it has arrived at the leaves, though stilt 

 highly aqueous, it is charged more abundantly with 

 extraneous matter than it was on its first imbibitiou 

 That the sap may serve for the proper nutriment of 

 the plant in its return from the leaves, it is necessary 

 that a large portion of the water should be eliminated, 

 an effect which is produced by the process of ex. 

 halation, in consequence of which the watery particles 

 pass off in the state of vapour, as may easily be ob- 

 served by the condensation of this insensible perspira- 

 tion on a glass or any other cold polished surface. The 

 fluid in such cases is found not to be pure water, but to 

 contain a slight per-centage of heterogeneous matter 

 This process is absolutely necessary to health, and where 

 it is impeded it is a fruitful source of mischief. It is in 

 a high degree dependent upon outward atmospheric 

 condition or other external causes, to which we shall 

 have to advert hereafter ; for it is altogether uncertain 

 whether in any case constitutional weakness prevents i: 

 from taking place, the effect of which would be to product 

 a general dropsy. The affection or condition which wfr 

 have under consideration isof a precisely contrary nature, 

 and can, when slight, scarcely be considered a disease. 

 It is not, however, a normal condition, or one which, 

 if chronic, could be productive of any other than 

 evil results. Under the circumstances of which we 

 speak, so far from the exhalation being impeded 

 it is exaggerated into a copious^ dripping of a 

 watery fluid from the leaves, to which the name of 

 weeping has been applied. It is not to be confounded 

 with the showers of manna which in hot weather 

 descend from many trees, and to which probably 

 the tales of the poets are for the most part appli- 

 cable, but is simply an overflow of the^ ascending 

 unelaborated sap, occurring principally if not ex- 

 clusively at the tips of the leaves or serratures, and 

 thus simulating in some measure the formation of 

 dew. It is peculiarly common in the S ine w ** 

 cultivated in conservatories, and m&y be seen 

 especial abundance in such plants as Canna, where 

 the watery fluid sometimes almost streams from tw 

 leaves. It is observed principally when water fl* 

 just been applied to the roots, and depends upon 

 the upward current being too strong to be arrestee 

 by the walls of the more external vessels, so * 

 to wait for the natural exhalation due to extern* 



insomuch that the fluid matter bursts fort* 

 bodily, the points of least resistance probably being wf 

 raore^or less acuminate portions of the foliage ^ roa ** 

 which it drips. It is very probable that there may w 

 some lesion of the cells at these points, or otherwise** 

 natural course should seem to be rather ^through u* 

 stomates. It would be interesting to institute a co 

 parison between the condensed fluid arising n*^| 

 evaporation, and the fluid thus exuded ; but we ar V n 

 able to find that such an estimate has at P resent ?L 

 made. The waste of matter due to the phenon^ 

 is probably never very large, but a little atte ^ ef 

 would soon show at what time of the day, £ r 

 what condition the evaporating power ot the ^ 

 sphere is such as to admit of this sensible passa 

 the fluid, and at such times and under such c^ d ^ 

 water should not be applied to the roots. As, h °* }ar 

 the phenomenon is far more visible in some par ^ 

 plants than in others, and is not exhibited **? flC 

 the same time and under similar conditions, it Pj^ 

 probably in great measure on constitutional pecu 

 over which the cultivator has no control.f 



266. A similar affection takes place in the 



~~"-mii i in in ■ i ■ ■ ■! r i.i n i .. » •— ■■ " ' ^*^^*^~-^~^^- ^ w— «.—— 



* Derived from «ro from and crctim to ** 01f c ar j*ee«&' 

 t An aqueous fluid is copious I v secreted in Nepp ; -' . p^it 



and Hetiamphora, and not improbably is derived from , 

 itself in Dischulia and some other cases where the fining ^ 

 in open cavities is supposed to he altogether oxtrane ' eT|or 

 relation some of these cases may have to the pn e p&&0 

 question is at present uncertain ; in others the tiuia n 



when 



agency ; 



buck f 



' properties, and is evidently a real secretion, 



