EVERGREEN TREES AND SHRUBS. 
547 
great trees of California and Oregon, where, in rich valleys, it 
grows to a height of one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet, 
with a trunk from five to ten feet in diameter. In appearance it 
strongly resembles our common balsam fir, but all its parts are on 
a larger scale. Downing mentions a specimen seen at Dropmore, 
England, which had been planted twenty-one years, and which was 
then sixty-two feet high ; of which he wrote : “ It resembles most 
the Norway spruce as one occasionally sees the finest form of that 
tree, having that graceful, downward sweep of the branches, and 
feathering out quite down to the turf ; but it is altogether more airy 
in form, and of a richer and darker green color. At this size it is 
the symbol of stately elegance.” Doubtless the Dropmore speci- 
men was an uncommonly beautiful one. A portrait of this fir, 
grown to full size, given in the Pacific R. R. Survey, has much of 
the formal, sombre air, of our old balsam firs. Hoopes (West- 
chester, Pa.), considers this much hardier than the Himalayan 
spruce, and less liable to be scorched by the summer sun ; but does 
not think it quite hardy. Sargent (at Fishkill, on the Hudson) 
says : “ Plants with us, in low damp ground, suffer occasionally in 
color if not in loss of leaves j while those grown in the shade, or 
on an exposed hill-side in poor, slaty soil, succeed admirably.” 
The Yew-leaved Douglass Spruce Fir. Abies D. taxifolia . — 
This is a variety with much longer leaves, and lesser growth, dis- 
tinguished also by the very level stratification of its branches. 
Probably not hardier than the above. 
Patton’s Giant California Fir. Abies Pattonii . — A native 
of California and Oregon, discovered by Lewis and Clarke, of 
which specimens are known growing to the height of three hundred 
feet, and trunks forty-two feet in circumference ! Scarcely known 
yet in our collections, though reported hardy in England. 
The Hemlock Fir. Abies canadensis . — This common native 
tree is certainly the most graceful, beautiful, and available of all 
evergreens for the embellishment of small places. Hardy as an 
oak, delicate and airy in outline as the grasses of a winter bouquet, 
soft to the touch, fragrant, yet forming deep masses of verdure 
