DESOEIPTIVE ENUMERATION OE TREES. 123 



the northern parts of Asia, also, and in the 

 southern parts of Africa, I doubt not but the Fir 

 may be found in great variety and perfection. In 

 Philip's voyage to Botany Bay, we are told of 

 Pines in Norfolk Island of an immense size. Later 

 accounts make some of these Pines, which have 

 been measured by a quadrant, to have attained the 

 wonderful height of two hundred and thirty feet. 

 They bear cones ; but the wood, from a sample 

 brought into England (in the possession of Sir 

 Joseph Banks), does not appear like deal, but is 

 much heavier, the grain considerably closer, and 

 the colour browner. The girth of the tree, from 

 which this sample was cut, was eighteen feet. 

 The first branches were at the elevation of thirty 

 yards, but I could not learn whether this circum- 

 stance was a general character of the tree, or 

 peculiar only to that individual. Strabo, indeed, 

 tells us that the Fir is wholly a European plant — 

 that it is never to be met with in any part of Asia — 

 and that it may even be considered, in all those 

 places where Europe and Asia border on each 

 other, as a distinguishing mark of European 

 ground. On the Asiatic side of the Tanais, he 



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