458 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number i? 



sometimes require centuries in which to reach their full size. 

 Few young trees are springing up on the Sierras to replace 

 the giants as they fall under the axe of the Nevada lumber- 

 man. Fires are increasing in number and destructiveness 

 in all this region, and it appears a foregone conclusion that 

 as a national source of lumber-supply the forest of Jeffrey's 

 Pine on the eastern side of the Sierras will have ceased to 

 exist before another quarter of a century has passed. 



The discovery of Pinus Jeffrey i was one of the results of 

 the so-called "Oregon expedition," an association of Scotch- 

 men who sent John Jeffrey, a Scotch gardener, to the 

 Pacific coast in 1852 to collect seeds and plants. He found 

 the Pine which now bears his name on Scott's Mountain, 

 a rugged range west of Mount Shasta, and in the same 

 region the rare Pinus Baljouriana, and, in different parts of 

 California, a number of other plants, including Pinus 

 Murrayana and Pinus albicaulis. These Pines and some 

 other trees were described and figured by Mr. Andrew 

 Murray, Secretary of the Oregon Association, and by Pro- 

 fessor Balfour in a pamphlet of three pages, without a title 

 or a title-page, but accompanied by five plates. It was 

 printed privately and distributed among the subscribers, 

 and is one of the rarest works which have been published 

 on North American trees. A single copy is now known 

 to exist in the United States. 



The illustration on page 461 represents a grove of 

 Jeffrey's Pine growing on an elevated spur of the Sierras, 

 above the Yosemite valley. The trees are characteristic 

 of the species as it is found at high elevations and in ex- 

 cessively exposed situations. They are small and stunted 

 in comparison with the great trees which grow at lower 

 elevations on the eastern side of the mountains, where, as 

 we have already said, this species is seen at its best. The 

 illustration is from a photograph made by Dr. William H. 

 Rollins, of Boston. 



Mr. P. L. Simmonds contributes to a recent issue of 

 the Gardeners' Chronicle some interesting information 

 about the so-called English walnuts, from which the fol- 

 lowing facts are gathered : 



There are many varieties of these nuts, such as the oval, 

 round, double, large and small-fruited, early and late, tender 

 thin-shelled and hard thick-shelled. An almost huskless va- 

 riety occurs in the north of China. The larger portion of the 

 walnuts consumed in England are of foreign growth, and 

 average in quantity about 250,000 bushels. The hulk of these 

 come from France, and Belgium, and small quantities from 

 Germany, Holland and Italy. 



Bordeaux is one of the largest exporting ports in the world, 

 perhaps the largest for walnuts ; and small quantities are now 

 sent from Chili to Europe. The culture of the so-called Eng- 

 lish Walnut, which, by the way, is not an English tree at all, 

 but a native of the Orient and of central and eastern Asia, from 

 whence it was early introduced into Europe, is now diffused 

 all over Italy, from the Alps to the valleys of Sicily. It is 

 thought, however, that the number of cultivated Walnut-trees 

 in Italy is diminishing as the demand for the timber is increas- 

 ing, being in great demand by the cabinet-maker. 



Persons with weak digestions will do well to bear in mind 

 Mr. Simmonds' warning, that walnuts, as long as the skin can 

 be easily removed from them, are a nutritious and healthy 

 article of diet ; but when they become dry, so that they cannot 

 be easily peeled, they are indigestible. 



Walnuts in the shell yield about one-third their weight of 

 picked kernels, which are the crumpled cotyledons or seed- 

 leaves. In some northern districts, particularly in Piedmont, 

 Walnut-trees have always been held in high estimation for the 

 production of oil, which, when newly made, has a very agree- 

 able taste, and can be employed in cookery as well as in the 

 preparation of varnish. 



The Walnut grows abundantly in Kashmir, Nepal and other 

 parts of India, where the fruits are largely used. It forms also 

 an important article of consumption in Japan, quantities being 

 eaten in a raw state. They are also much used for making a 

 kind of confection, by cracking and removing the shell with- 

 out hurling the kernel, which is afterward coated with white 

 sugar, thus making an attractive and agreeable sweetmeat. 



The Walnut also furnishes in Japan a bland oil, used for 

 domestic purposes. In China it seems to be pressed for oil, 



as in some years over 12,000 tons are exported from the port of 

 Tientsin in the year. The Walnut is extensively cultivated in 

 the Punjab, among the Himalayas and in Afghanistan, a large 

 annual supply being brought to the plains of India by the Kabuli 

 and other traders from the hills. There are several well- 

 known forms of this nut met with, the soft-shelled kind of 

 Kashmir and Chamba being considered the best. 



The Gardens of Le Notre. 



THE determining power of fitness, appropriateness, in all 

 -*- periods when art has really been great, the fact that its 

 greatness sprang from its truthful expression of material needs 

 and social conditions, is well shown by the following passage, 

 which we quote from Planat's " Encyclopedic del'Architecture 

 et de la Construction." What, asks the author, were the archi- 

 tectural requirements of society in the time of Louis Ouatorze ? 

 "Spacious, richly decorated apartments, in which The court 

 could stand in state while awaiting the passage of the king ; in 

 which painting and sculpture should play a secondary, deco- 

 rative role, not the principal role as in Italian palaces. In an 

 Italian gallery art was the chief occupant ; here it was society ; 

 there, architecture supplied a setting for pictures and statues ; 

 here, pictures and statues adorned the architecture. French 

 society demanded festal halls and gardens which might serve 

 as open-air drawing-rooms, prolonging the architecture of 

 the noble and stately palaces ; gardens embellished with white 

 allegorical statues and colonnades, with trimmed hedges en- 

 closing rooms of living green ; gardens furnished here and there 

 with marble stairways, whereon the court could range itself 

 in successive rows ; gardens with canals and lakes dotted over 

 with pleasure-galleys bedecked with flags, and with carefully 

 managed perspectives opening in all directions. Under Louis 

 Seize it became the fashion to ridicule these geometrical par- 

 terres, these trimmed Yews, these waters trained to spout in 

 complicated patterns and figures, this entire absence of all 

 real nature." But, the author explains, it was much more 

 ridiculous for courtiers to disport themselves in the "dairies" 

 of the Trianon, aping in satin and powder the tasks and 

 amusements of peasants. The main fact is, that the destina- 

 tion of such gardens as those of Versailles " precluded all pre- 

 tension to rusticity ; that their architecture could serve only as 

 a setting or background for the toilets of ladies in grand state 

 and the costumes of men dressed in velvets and brocades ; 

 surely damp grass, wet ground, bushes and underbrush were 

 out of the question in the circumstances. ... In the city like- 

 wise, from the street which was still usually narrow and dirty 

 and was nothing more than a way of communication, a lofty 

 porte-cochere gave entrance to a vast court, where a great 

 number of carriages could freely circulate ; a noble flight of 

 steps hospitably offered access to a well-lighted vestibule. Gal- 

 leries with high windows opened, even in Paris, on broad reg- 

 ularly laid-out gardens, which imparted a seigneurial air to the 

 edifice. Studying the old city maps one is struck by the num- 

 ber and extent of these gardens, and their existence explains 

 the fact that so little attention was paid to the plan of the 

 streets themselves." 



The Weeds of California — V. 



THE entire tribe of Ragweeds (Ambrosia) is absent from the 

 -*- California list of weeds. The native Franseriais innocent. 



Sonchus oleraceus (the Milk Thistle of Californians) and 

 Senecio vulgaris thrive as well in California as anywhere in the 

 world, and are found throughout the settled portions of the 

 state. The Senecio will germinate in the middle of the 

 summer's drought almost as well as the Centaureas. 



Erigeron Canadense affects chiefly the irrigated lands, and 

 there demonstrates an unexpected resistance to even very 

 strong alkali, such as few useful plants could resist. In 

 Fresno and Tulare counties it reaches easily the height of eight 

 feet, and forms thickets not pleasant to penetrate. In un- 

 irrigated lands it rarely becomes troublesome, and is of small 

 stature, but, nevertheless, maintains itself fully where once 

 established. 



Cichorium Intybus obstinately retains possession of fields 

 where it has been cultivated, and spreads more or less, but 

 outside of such cases can hardly be considered troublesome. 



The Matricaria discoidea is extensively diffused in the state, 

 and lines the roadsides all over the Bay country, emitting its 

 pleasant fragrance in the hot sun. Chrysanthemum Leimanthe- 

 mum has gained a foothold in a few localities in the same 

 region, but is not troublesome, and does not seem to spread 

 rapidly. C. segetum is found at a few points on the Bay 

 borders. 



