206 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 167. 



these two varieties and pretend to be able to distinguish 

 the trees which produce them, an assumption which still 

 needs demonstration. The conditions which lead to the 

 formation by the same species of such different wood are 

 not well understood ; in the case of the Douglas Fir they 

 are probably due to soil and elevation, and, in part at 

 least, to the age of the individual. The wood of the 

 Douglas Fir is known in commerce as red fir, yellow fir 

 and Oregon pine, the last name belonging, however, more 

 properly to the wood of the Yellow Pine {Pinus ponderosa) 

 of western America. It furnishes the principal product of 

 the immense saw-mills situated on Puget Sound, and is 

 manufactured, besides, wherever forests of this tree exist ; 

 it is used for all sorts of building purposes and for con- 

 struction, railway ties and fuel. 



' The Douglas Fir was discovered late in the last century 

 by Archibald Menzies, Vancouver's surgeon and naturalist 

 on his voyage of discovery ; and a few years later Lewis 

 and Clark found it in Montana during their transcontinental 

 journey. David Douglas rediscovered it on the Columbia 

 River in 1825 and introduced it into England; and it is the 

 name of this bold and enterprising botanist which has be- 

 come associated with this tree, although, unhappily, it 

 cannot bear it in the language of science. No tree is more 

 unfortunate in its name ; and there are few instances where 

 the application of the rules which govern botanical nomen- 

 clature has produced a more unsatisfactory result. Lam- 

 bert, who first named the tree, called it Pinus taxifolia, from 

 the fancied resemblance of the leaves to those of the Yew- 

 tree ; then Lindley, disregarding Lambert's specific name, 

 named it Abies Douglasii \\\ honor of its rediscoverer. Car- 

 riere, recognizing the characters which separate this tree 

 from the true Firs, coined for his genus a bastard word, 

 half Greek and half Japanese, and called it Pseudotseuga, 

 a perfectly improper name, as it has little in common with 

 Tsuga, the Japanese name for the Hemlock. Carriere re- 

 tained, however, Lindley's Douglasii, calling the tree Pseu- 

 dolsuda Douglasii, but as Lambert's specific name is the 

 oldest, the Douglas Fir must be known as Pseudotsuga taxi- 

 folia, a name bad in every way, and especially bad in 

 its failure to recognize, the name of Douglas, which, more 

 than that of any other man, should be associated with it. 



The Douglas Fir has proved itself in cultivation to be an 

 ornamental tree of great value. The largest specimen in 

 England is already more than no feet high, with a stout 

 trunk furnished with branches from ground to tip, and 

 showing no signs of diminishing vigor or beauty. The 

 earliest attempts at cultivating the Douglas Fir in the east- 

 ern states were not successful ; the trees raised from seed, 

 gathered in the mild and humid climate of the north-west 

 or in England, first planted here were unable, except in ex- 

 ceptional positions, to support our climate for any length of 

 time. The late Dr. Parry, however, in 1862 discovered the 

 Douglas Fir growing on the eastern slopes of the Rocky 

 Mountains of Colorado in a climate distinguished by the 

 severity of the cold of winter and by the drought of sum- 

 mer ; he sent seed, to the Botanic Garden at Cambridge, 

 and the plants raised from this seed have proved hardy in 

 the most trying situations in New England. Some of these 

 trees are now more than twenty feet high, and although it 

 is too soon to speak with anything like certainty in the 

 matter, there is reason to hope that they will grow to a 

 large size and retain their beauty for many years. 



Much attention has been given to the Douglas Fir of late 

 years as a subject for forest-planting in Europe, although 

 the best authorities on such matters do not yet agree as to 

 its value for this purpose. Large experimental forest-plan- 

 tations are made every year, especially in some parts of 

 Germany, where some forest-experts believe that the 

 Douglas Fir is to rival and finally replace the Larch in 

 Europe as a timber-tree. It has the merit of growing with 

 surprising rapidity and of producing a large amount of 

 timber in a comparatively short time. Few coniferous 

 trees grow as rapidly as the Douglas Fir, and it is not un- 

 common to see self-sown seedlings in Washington and 



Oregon producing, when they stand very close together in 

 good soil, annual shoots twelve feet long. 



A remarkable form of the Douglas Fir, distinguished by 

 its large cones, occurs on the San Bernardino Mountains, in 

 California. It has been considered a variety of the typical 

 tree, and by some botanists a second species — a view sup- 

 ported by the fact that no intermediate forms connecting it 

 with the type have been found, while in the region north 

 and south of that occupied by this large fruited tree 

 the typical Douglas Fir abounds. 



The beauty of the trunk of the Douglas Fir and the 

 spread of its great buttress-like roots are shown in the illus- 

 tration on page 211. It is from a photograph by Notman, 

 of this city, and represents a tree of medium size standing 

 in the park at Vancouver, in British Columbia. 



A California Cemetery. 



T 1 



fHE most beautiful cemetery in California, the one that is 

 more nearly what a cemetery should be than any other in 

 the state, is Mountain View, near Oakland. It is a nest in the 

 foot-hills, shut out from harsh winds, and so varied in surface 

 that when Mr. Frederick Law Olmsted drew the plans, about 

 1865, he is said to have expressed the greatest pleasure in the 

 "opportunities for landscape-gardening" that the tract afforded. 

 Owing to unfortunate complications, Mr. Olmsted's plans for 

 the University grounds were neglected, but the Mountain View 

 Cemetery is his sufficient memorial on the Pacific coast. 



For twenty-five years a group of prominent Oakland men 

 have worked together developing a beautiful garden of the 

 dead. In some portions there is too much expensive and 

 grandiose monumental glitter, but for the most part good 

 sense and modesty prevaii, and trees, vines, flowers and run- 

 ning water unite to make a quiet loveliness. This very March 

 morning as I sat in a perfect tangle of trees, Roses and wild 

 Blackberry-vines in the winding valley that crosses the grounds 

 from hill to hill, I heard the shrill piping of California quail in 

 the copse, and presently saw a very gentle-minded "cotton- 

 tail" rabbit a few yards away meditating on the phenomenon 

 of a reporter's pencil and pad. Looking up I saw three hum- 

 ming-birds poised above the Cherry-blossoms of some old 

 trees in a half-acre orchard planted by some pioneer, and left 

 by the landscape-gardener to give a pleasant homely effect to 

 this part of the grounds. All the while birds kept singing 

 everywhere — golden orioles, brown robins, meadow larks, 

 hosts of blackbirds in the tree-tops. Such places as this are in 

 all the ravines ; the rounded hills are planted with flowers and 

 shrubs, but most of the trees are set in the richer soil below. 



The late superintendent, Mr. William Collins, was a man of 

 much executive ability, a Scotsman of the Scots, and abso- 

 lutely devoted to the enterprise. He made every square rod 

 of the land produce growth and beauty. Many flowers bloom 

 even in midwinter at Mountain View, and miles of Rose bor- 

 ders, in which all the newest sorts are represented, extend 

 along the drives. Masses of Iris, Lilies and Daffodils, and the 

 simple old-fashioned flowers that appeal to every heart, re- 

 main to illustrate the late superintendent's methods. In the 

 way of trees he planted great numbers of Magnolias, English 

 Laurels, Oranges and the finer broad-leaved evergreens, with 

 Acacias and the rarer conifers, but the latter have been but 

 sparingly used, except in a few bold masses. An almost con- 

 tinuous belt of Eucalypti, Monterey Cypresses and Pines 

 sweeps around the western and southern sides of Mountain 

 View and shuts out the city beyond. Higher hills lie to the 

 east, and over these the cemetery can be extended whenever 

 it is necessary to have more room. In this wilder region there 

 are many ledges of rock that stand out of the hill-side like 

 Cyclopean walls. A few similar ledges are within the present 

 limit of the cemetery, and are covered with vines and rock- 

 plants, sach as Cacti, Cistuses and the low succulents. Several 

 large boulders of trap-rock have been used as monuments, 

 and the possibilities in this direction of the castle-like ledges of 

 the adjacent tract are certainly very striking. One of the rock- 

 piles stands at the head of a ravine overlooking the whole val- 

 ley, and covers a parallelogram of fifty by a hundred feet in 

 extent, and rises forty feet above the slope. Five or six good 

 specimens of Quercus agrifolia grow upon the top of the 

 splintered ledge, and it would be easy to hew out a vault be- 

 neath their roots, if one chose, and to cover the whole pile 

 with vines. Such a "memorial mound" would be far more 

 in keeping with Mountain View, as it was planned, than the 

 stateliest mausoleum of polished Rocklin granite or Amador 



