THE CRYPTOMERIA 217 
We must, from a cursory observer’s point of view, 
congratulate it sincerely on the success of its conceal- 
ment. Anything more unlike a Cedar from an 
ordinary point of view we can scarcely imagine. 
The bark is different, the branches are different, the 
leaves are different, and the very colour of them is 
different. Everything about them looks as different 
as can be. What claims to any portion or 
heritage—for that is the sense of the meaning of 
the Greek word pépos—of the Cedar’s possessions or 
prepossessions the Cryptomerias might institute, 
would confound and dumfound, we cannot but think, 
the finding of any ordinarily intelligent body of 
jurymen. If the tree itself is cryptic on the subject 
of whose image he bears, so also are literary authori- 
ties—those at least that have come my way—upon 
the question of any supposed likeness that it may 
bear to our Cedars of Lebanon, Africa, or the Hima- 
layas. 
The Cryptomeria, it is admitted, bears some sort 
of resemblance to, not sufficient to present any con- 
fusion with, the Athrotaxis, but yet enough to set 
us wondering if they ever shared any common an- 
cestry. As the Athrotaxis calls to mind some of the 
short-leaved Queensland Araucarias, so we- would 
have thought, had we not learnt better by book, 
that some sort of relationship might have existed 
between the Cryptomeria and Araucaria. 
As between the two, Athrotaxis and Cryptomeria, 
and the question which is which, there really should 
arise no confusion. The Athrotaxis is altogether a 
larger-fruited, bigger-leaved edition of the Crypto- 
meria. Their individual identities, when seen side 
by side, are as clear as the sun should be at noonday, 
and as pronounced as that between a greyhound and 
a bulldog. While the Common Cryptomeria has 
fine, unnoticeably incurved leaves, the Athrotaxis 
