CHAP. CXIU. 



CONI'FERjE. P1 X NVS. 



2207 



about 50 ft. high. They were 

 received from the Hammer- 

 smith Nursery, and marked in 

 the garden with the name of P. 

 uncinata; but, in 1834, cones 

 were produced, when they were 

 found to be those of P. Pallas- 

 iana. Both these trees, Mr. 

 Nevin informs us, are equally 

 robust and vigorous ; but the 

 one throws out its branches in 

 the most grotesque and luxu- 

 riant manner, with a knotty 

 stem, while the other has an 

 elegant cypress-like form. Mr. 

 Niven has sent us specimens 

 with cones of both varieties ; 

 but the cones of these speci- 

 mens do not appear to differ 

 in the least. There is a tree 

 in the Horticultural Society's 

 Garden, considered there as the 

 true P. PallaskW, which has 

 borne cones, and of which Jig. 

 2089. is a portrait, to our usual 

 scale ; but it is evidently not 

 the P. Pallasiawa of Lambert, 

 but rather some other variety 

 of P. Larlcio less different from 

 the species. There is another 

 tree in the same garden, mark- 

 ed P. taurica, which has not 

 borne cones ^ and, though it 

 differs somewhat in habit from 

 the tree marked there P. Pal- 

 lasidna, being more fastigiate, 

 we have no doubt it will be 

 found, when it comes to pro- 

 duce cones, to be some other 

 slight variation of P. Laricio 

 In rare species, of every kind, 

 it is very natural to take ad- 

 vantage of slight shades of 

 difference, and to hold them out as varieties, which, in species that are 

 common, would be altogether neglected. For example, there might be 

 many very distinct varieties selected from Scotch pine woods, quite as dif- 

 ferent from one another as the different varieties and subvarieties of P. La- 

 ricio ; but, as P. sylvestris is a very common tree, no cultivator thinks it 

 worth his while to bring its varieties or variations into notice. 

 Description. " A large tree, about the size of P. sylvestris, but much more 

 spreading, sending out numerous large, declining, and horizontal branches 

 from the summit to the base ; the lower branches almost equalling the trunk 

 itself in size. Bark cracked, rugged, brown, scaling off. Wood compact, 

 white, brownish red in the centre, resinous, very knotty. Leaves in tv\ os, 

 crowded, erect, rigid, semi-cylindrical, glabrous, somewhat shining, light green; 

 5 in. long; roughly serrulated on the margin, canaliculate above, furnished at the 

 apex with a sharp cartilaginous mucro; sheaths short, about |in. long, round, 

 covered externally with loose scales, membraneous, and torn on the margin ; 



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