FOR VICTORIAN INDUSTRIAL CULTURE. 



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Selinum anesorrhizum, F. v. Muller. {Anesorrhiza Capen- 

 sis, Ch. and Schl.) 

 South Africa. The root of this biennial herb is edible. A. 

 montana (Eckl. and Zejh.), a closely allied plant, yields like- 

 wise an edible root, and so it is with a few other species of 

 the section Anesorrhiza. 



Selinum Monnieri, Linne. 



From East Asia now extending to South Europe, preferring 

 moist places. An annual herb, praised by the Chinese as 

 valuable for medicinal purposes. 

 Sequoia sempervirens, Endlicher.* [Taxodium sempervirens, 

 Lambert.) 



Red- Wood or Bastard-Cedar of North- West America, chiefly 

 California. A splendid tree, 360 feet high, occasionally with 

 a diameter of the stem of fifty-five feet. The wood is reddish, 

 close-veined, but light and brittle. One of the most colossal 

 trees of the globe. Its growth is about thirty-two feet in six- 

 teen years. Often found on metamorphic sandstone. 



Sequoia Wellingtonia, Seemann.* {Wellingtonia gigantea, 

 Lindley.) 



Mammoth-tree. California, up to 5000 feet above the sea. 

 This, the biggest of all trees, attains a stem of 320 feet in 

 length and 112 feet in circumference, the oldest trees being 

 estimated at 1100 years. The total height of a tree will 

 occasionally be 450 feet. A stem broken at 300 feet had yet 

 a diameter of eighteen feet. The wood is soft and white 

 when felled, afterwards it turns red. Traditional accounts 

 seem to have overrated the height of the Mammoth-tree. In 

 the Calaveras-grove two of the largest trees, which may have 

 been the tallest of all, were destroyed; the two highest now 

 existing there are respectively 325 and 319 feet high, with a 

 circumference of forty-five and forty feet at six feet from the 

 ground. At the Mariposa-grove the highest really measured 

 trees are 272, 270 and 260 feet high, but one of these has the 

 enormous circumference of sixty-seven feet at six feet from 

 the ground, while another, the height of which is not recorded, 

 is ninety-three feet in girth at the ground and sixty-four feet 

 at eleven feet from it; the branches of this individual tree 

 are as thick as the stems of large Elms. The height of the 

 Calaveras-groA^e is 4760 feet above sea-level. Both Sequoias 

 produce shoots from the root after the stem is cut away. 



Sesamum Indicum, Linne. 



The Gingili. Southern Asia, extending eastwards to Japan. 

 This annual herb is cultivated as far as 42° north latitude. 

 The oil, fresh expressed from the seeds, is the best for table 

 use ; free of any impleasant taste. In Greece the seeds are 



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