18 



BRITISH EOCENE ELORA. 



twenty overlapping, leathery, longitudinally-ribbed scales. Sphenolepidium Kurrianum, 

 apparently common in the Portuguese Cretaceous, has very finely imbricated foliage, and 

 cones apparently smaller, but not dissimilar to the last. It would thus appear that the 

 Cupressinese were not completely differentiated until the Eocene Period. 



The tribe is not abundantly represented in European Tertiary strata until the 

 Miocene age ; but it appears even rarer in the great series of Arctic floras described by 

 Heer, — a singular fact, as most of them are now only adapted to temperate climates of 

 the Northern Hemisphere. The presence of Libocedrus is alone well ascertained there ; 

 Tliuyites, Tlmyopsis, and Widdrivgtonia being founded on very fragmentary and almost 

 unique twigs. 



A few of the Cupressinese, namely, some Cypresses and Junipers, inhabit swamps or 

 places liable to inundation, while other species of the same genera seek out the loftiest 

 mountains, and excel almost all other shrubs in hardiness, Juniper and Cypress being 

 found in Central Asia at altitudes of 15,000 and 1G,000 feet. The Juniper is the most 

 hardy, creeping, as low scrub-bushes, on most mountain chains to far beyond the 

 limits of trees, and occupying to the south the barren rocks of Cape Horn (./. uvifera), 

 and to the north penetrating Labrador, Newfoundland, Hudson's Bay, and Greenland 

 (/. canadensis). Some appear to adapt themselves to a great range of climate. 

 Fitzroya, a stately tree 100 feet in height on the Avestern slopes of the Patagonian 

 mountains, dwindles to a small bush a few inches high on the confines of perpetual 

 snow; and the Chilian Libocedrus, \()^ feet high on the Cordilleras, dwarfs to a small 

 bush in Magellan. 



Although of relatively less bulk than the Sequoias and Pines, some species attain 

 colossal dimensions, as the Oregon " Red Cedar" {Thuya giyantea), a plank of which was 

 exhibited in the Philadelphia Exhibition from a tree 325 feet high and 22 feet in diameter ; 

 Libocedrus decurrens exceeds 200 feet; and the Himalayan Cupressus torulosa has been 

 met with 150 feet in height. 



The woods of several of the species are valuable and many of the gums, balsams, 

 and resins are their products. 



Of the seven genera^ recognised in the ' Genera Plantarum,' Eitzroya alone has not 

 yet been found fossil ; and Actinostrobus is at present represented by a single cone 

 from Sagor.^ The very extensive genus Juniperus, present in every geographical 



1 The mottled butt-wood of Callitris quadrivalvis, the " Thuya" of Pliny and " Citrus" of Horace, 

 commanded fabulous prices during the Roman Empire. Cicero is said to have paid a million sesterces 

 (£9000) for a table made from this wood ; and of two tables belonging to King Juba, and sold by 

 auction, one fetched 1,200,000 sesterces, although the largest recorded diameter was only about fifty-four 

 inches. 



' Widdrmgto7iia, Frenela, Chamoecyparis, and other generic names frequently made use of in works 

 on fossil plants, are treated by Hooker and Bentham, whose classification is here followed, as subgenera. 



" The specimen described by Ettingshausen in 1859 is ignored by Schimper in his ' Paleontologie 

 Vegetale.' 



