230 A MANUAL OF THE CONIFEK2E. 



older these are suooeeded by scale-like, closely appressed, imbricated 

 yellowish-green leaves; it is then of erect habit, with horizontal 

 branches which lengthen as the tree arrives at maturity, when they 

 become pendulous at their extremities, and from these main branches, 

 others long and slender, hang down towards the ground, giving the- 

 whole tree a weeping and graceful form. * 



Habitat— China,, the north-east provinces, from the Hang-chow River 

 to the Great WaU.f 



Introduced in 1846 by Mr. Eobert Fortune. 



The Funereal Cypress first became known to Europeans during Lord 

 Macartney's Embassy to Pekin in 1792, when it was seen in the 

 "Vale of the Tombs," in north China. Mr. Fortune met with it about 

 150 miles up the Hang-chow Eiver, in the neighbourhood of the far- 

 famed tea country of Whey-chow, 10° farther south, from whence he 

 sent the first seeds received in England to Messrs. Standish & Co., of 

 Bagshot, by whom plants were subsequently distributed. Mr. Fortune 

 also saw this Cypress farther west, where it is more common; and 

 "frequently in clumps on the sides of the hills, where it had a most 

 striking and beautiful effect on the Chinese landscape." The expectation 

 that the Funereal Cypress would prove as hardy in England as the 

 Indian Deodar or Cryptomeria japonica, has not been realised. Its growth 

 is slow, and it is liable to injury in severe weather, especially by cold 

 winds, by which the young branehlets are killed and the plant much 

 disfigured. If seed could be procured from the northern limit of its 

 habitat, where the rigour of the climate is fully equal to that of ours, 

 it is highly probable that a hardier race would be obtained, and that 

 this remarkable tree may yet be employed in the decoration of . the parks, 

 pleasure-grounds, and cemeteries of Great Britain, for which it is one 

 of the most distinct and effective known. In Sikkim, where it is an 

 introduced plant, its fragrant red wood is burnt in the temples for 

 incense. :£ 



Oupressus Goveniana. — A low tree or shrub, of dense habit, 

 with spreading branches and bright green foliage; the branehlets 

 are numerous, irregularly disposed, and slender, the leaves scale-like, 

 and closely imbricated. In the early spring this plant is covered 

 with innumerable yellow male catkins, which, for the time, give it a 

 very striking appearance ; so plentifully is the pollen produced, that 



* Mr. Eobert Fortune, in the Gardeners' Chronicle for 1850, p. 228. 



t Gardeners' Chronicle, 1850, pp. 228, 437. 



J Sir J. D. Hooker, Himalayan Journals, vol. i., p. 315. 



