64 



God was like unto him in beauty." In this country it is ' as 

 familiar an adjunct to English manor houses as the yew is to 

 churchyards." The Lebanon Cedar therefore requires no intro- 

 duction here. Some remarkably fine specimens are growing on 

 the lawns at Heron Court. There is a stone close by bearing the 

 date 1 815, so these noble trees, planted in the year of Waterloo, 

 are now over one hundred years old. The largest is about 65ft. 

 high with a girth of 16ft. i|in. At Kingston Lacy I saw recently 

 a Lebanon Cedar 70ft. high with a girth of 17ft. It had a tablet 

 at the foot stating it was planted by the Duke of Wellington in 

 1827 — that is twelve years after the battle of Waterloo. There are 

 no doubt similar Lebanon cedars with equally interesting historical 

 associations in many parts of the country. From the point of view 

 of size, that is, for height and girth combined Elwes says there is no 

 Lebanon cedar to equal the splendid tree at Pains Hill near Cob- 

 ham in Surrey. In 1904 this measured 115ft. to 120ft. in height 

 with a girth of 26ft. 5m. Perhaps the tallest cedar in England is 

 at Petworth Park, which in 1905 was not less than 125ft. by 1 4^ft. 

 in girth. 



Sir Herbert Maxwell says " on the whole the best species of 

 cedar for planting in this country, whether for timber or ornament, 

 is the Cedar of Mount Atlas or Atlantic cedar." This differs from 

 the Lebanon cedar in its more erect habit and its less tendency to 

 wide-branching. The branchlets are not pendulous and are usually 

 covered with a short dense down. There is little difference in the 

 length of the leaves, but they are usually as thick or thicker than 

 broad. The cones are usually shorter and more cylindrical. In 

 one variety of the Atlantic cedar the leaves are more or less 

 deciduous. There are quite a number of very ornamental glaucous 

 forms well worthy of cultivation. Occasionally self-sown seedlings 

 come up near the parent tree as at Cooper's Hill, near Windsor. 

 A fine Atlantic cedar 72ft. in height with a girth of 13ft. 8in. grows 

 in the grove of Charborough Park. Another flourishes at Canford 

 Manor which is 75ft. high, with a girth of 13ft. 5m. There is a 

 further tree in Cedar Wood Park 95ft. in height with a girth of 

 12ft. 4m. and a glaucous variety also at Cedar Wood Park 75ft. 

 in height with a girth of 6ft. 2in. 



Ordinarily the Deodar may be distinguished from either the 

 Lebanon or Atlantic cedar" by the graceful drooping of its branches 

 and the longer needles. Two well-marked varieties are known 

 with green and glaucous foliage. The deodar is found wild in the 

 Western Himalaya at 4,000 to 10,000ft. It there attains a large 

 size. Probably on account of the great difference in climate the 

 deodar has not fully adapted itself to the conditions in this 

 country. As Sir Herbert Maxwell remarks, " our mild restless 

 winters and cool summers" may account for this. Large 

 numbers of deodars were planted in the New Forest in the spring 

 of 1856, but it was reported that they proved a failure as they died 

 off unaccountably when about forty or fifty years old. The Hon. 

 Gerald Lascelles mentioned that there were some notable excep- 



