414 WELLINGTONIA. 



Gen. WELLINaTONIA. lAndley. The Mammoth 



Tree. 



Flowers monoecious, or male and female, separate, but on the 

 same plant. 



Cones large, solitary, obtusely oval, and woody. 



Scales placed at right angles upon the axis of the cone, 

 wedge-shaped, persistent, and peltated. 



Seeds from three to five under each scale, but mostly five. 



Seed-leaves from three to six, but mostly in fours. 



Leaves needle-shaped, spiral, and persistent, or scale-formed, 

 and imbricated on adult trees. 



Named in compliment to the late Duke of Wellington. 



A gigantic tree from California. 



The Genus Wellingtonia is considered by most systematic 

 botanists as untenable, it not being sufficiently distinct from 

 Professor Endlicher's Genus Sequoia; nevertheless, as the 

 name has now been universally adopted in Garden Literature, 

 it had much better be allowed to stand, as its alteration would 

 cause great inconvenience and much confusion in practical 

 Botany. 



The seed-leaves (cotyledons) are from three to six in number, 

 but mostly in fours in WeUingtonia, while those of the Sequoia 

 are mostly in twos, but sometimes in threes. 



The leaves on matured plants of Wellingtonia are also scale- 

 formed, closely imbricated, and attached to the branch by a 

 broad base ; and when, as happens in the more vigorous shoots, 

 the leaves acquii-e unusual development ; they still are sessile, 

 with a triangular section, and no tendency whatever to form a 

 fiat leaf; while the leaves of the Sequoia always acquire the 

 form and expansion of a Taxus, and are two-rowed. 



