858 PLATANACEiE. 



the country. 1 '* Again the winter of 1818 and 1814, 

 remarkable for the severity of its frost, proved fatal to 

 most of the large Occidental Planes that had escaped in 

 1809, a circumstance that fully accounts for the rarity 

 of trees of this species throughout the kingdom of any ex- 

 traordinary dimensions or advanced age at the present time. 



As an ornamental tree the Occidental is in no way 

 inferior to the Eastern Plane. Its stem exhibits the same 

 picturesque effect, as its bark is equally liable to scale off, 

 and the tints thus produced by the contrast of colour of 

 the new and old bark, oifers to the pencil, as Gilpin 

 observes, " those smart touches which have so much effect 

 in painting.' 1 The same author remarks, " that no tree 

 forms a more pleasing shade than the Occidental Plane. 

 It is full-leaved, and its leaf is large, smooth, of a fine 

 texture, and seldom injured by insects. Its lower branches 

 shooting horizontally soon take a direction to the ground ; 

 and the spray seems more sedulous than that of any tree 

 we have, by twisting about in various forms, to fill up 

 every little vacuity with shade. 1 '' 



The timber of the Occidental Plane may be said to 

 be scarcely known in England, as it has hitherto only 

 been planted for its ornamental properties, and never with 

 a view to profit ; from Michaux we learn that, though of 

 a close grain and susceptible of a high polish, it cannot, 

 from its liability to warp, be used for delicate cabinet 

 purposes, but is made into bedsteads and other bulky 

 articles ; its colour when old is dull reddish brown, and 

 the medullary rays, extending from the centre to the 

 circumference, and which divide the concentric rings into 



* For a further account of the destruction of the Occidental Plane in various 

 parts of England by the frost of 1800, our readers are referred to the " Gentle- 

 man's Magazine 1 ' for 1810 and 1813. 



