﻿164 Canadian Record of Science. 



beyond the range of ihe present Canadian forest, immense 

 as it is, and to tlie consideration of other facts bearing 

 upon their probable ancestry, in regard to which, however, 

 the results, so far, are insufficient to warrant satisfactory 

 conclusions. 



These trees, and their extra-Canadian allies, have been 

 variously described by botanists, at different times, under 

 the several generic names : Finns, Abies, Picea. Linnseus, 

 upon whose system our nomenclature is founded, 

 embraced under Pinus : the true pines, the Lebanon 

 cedar, the larch, the silver (or balsam) fir, and the 

 hemlock. In selecting specific names for the silver fir and 

 spruce, he adopted those used by Pliny and other classical 

 writers, who called the spruce Picea and the silver fir 

 Abies. But he unfortunately transposed these names, 

 calling the spruce Pinus Abies, and the silver fir P. Picea. 

 This opened the way for much confusion, for when the old 

 aggregate genus Pinus came to be successively divided up 

 into segregate genera, and the classical names were 

 adopted as generic ones, choice had to be made between 

 two courses — either to apply these names so as to denote 

 the trees intended by the classical writers, or to use them, 

 at variance with classical usage, in accordance with the 

 Linnsean nomenclature. As has just been indicated, 

 succeeding botanists separated the true pines, and other 

 marked groups of the Linnaean genus Pinus, into separate 

 genera ; at first the spruces and firs were classed together 

 under the one generic name Abies. Link, in 1841, 

 separated the two groups into distinct genera, restoring 

 the classical names, Picea for the spruces, and Abies 

 for the firs. But in Britain, where Conifer?e have been 

 grown to an enormous extent, both for ornament and use, 

 especially since the middle of the present century, a silver 

 fir continued to be almost universally called a Picea, and 

 a spruce an Abies — until within the last few years, when 

 English scientific writers have adopted Link's use of the 



