PARK AND CE-METERY 
470 
best one years ago, it was decidedly starved and un- 
happy, and had often had its foliage completely 
browned ofif by winter. Such are not Deodars at all, 
I wouldn’t wonder but the so-called thermal belts of 
the Southern Alleghanies and the Northwest Pacific 
coast would mature the trees best, for these regions 
with warmer summers, correspond most nearly in cli- 
mates with those of Britain where the trees are known 
to grow well. The English formed great expectations 
for the Deodar during the years from 1822 to 1831, 
and onwards to the early fifties. It was much of a 
failure at Kew for all that, but northward from 
Yorkshire to Perth there are now many fine trees of 
70 or 80 feet or more. The first cones in cultivation 
were produced during 1858 at Bicton, Derbyshire. 
J. D. Hooker has called the Deodar “Libani var. Deo- 
dara,” but it would probably be nearer the natural 
facts to consider Libani a form of Deodara. There 
are numerous varieties, such as C. D. erecta, robusta, 
crassifolia and compacta, as forms of growth, and 
viridis, argentea, aurea, variegata and albo-spica 
as forms of colouring. The cones of all are identical 
as to structure and even the extreme so-called specific 
shapes may be connected by intermediates. 
C. Libani, “The Cedar of Lebanon,” is the form 
longest known to cultvation. There is a tree at Bret- 
by, Derbyshire, wh'ich was planted in 1676. It is not 
so certain that Solomon built his temple of these trees 
for the ancient Hebrews and Greeks called Junipers 
“cedars,” just as people do yet. The varied habit of 
the Lebanon group is well shown in the illustration. 
They grow in a valley of about 6,000 feet elevation, 
four miles south of the summit of Mount Lebanon, 
where they are now the only kind of timber. There 
are a few other groups northward, but no young seed- 
lings. The wood is harder and altogether better than 
when grown in Britain. The tree has been in cultiva- 
tion in the states for at least 100 years. There is one 
at Flushing, L. L, of just that age. There is also a 
good tree or two in the Philadelphia cemeteries. These 
are tabular forms. There is a pyramidal tree at 
Princeton, N. J., which was figured by Downing in 
1859, when 36 feet high. It is now about 60 feet; and 
has borne cones. I have heard of old trees in the up- 
per south, but can’t learn definitely about them. Many 
of the plants imported nowadays seem soft and un- 
satisfactory and nurserymen should try to do better, 
for cedar cones travel well and are produced in many 
places. C. Atlantica was introduced from Algeria 
about 1842. It differs but little from the Lebanon 
form when old, in fact both are said to grow together 
on the mountains at elevation of 3,500 feet and more. 
Both have lots of varieties. There is a splendid C. Li- 
bani argentea at Dropmore of more than 80 feet high. 
Frost used to say it differed from C. Atlantica scarce- 
ly at all except in the more drooping branchlets. C. 
Atlantica glauca is its counterpart. Then there is an 
Atlantica pendula and another called pyramidalis. 
Libani has varieties called pyramidata, pendula, 
stricta and the Cyprian form called brevifolia. Larix, 
“the larch,” has 8 species, natives of Northern Eu- 
rope, Asia and America. The European kind has 
several varieties and is best known in cultivation. It 
is deciduous, as are all the larches, and very useful 
as a nurse tree, where it does well. The American 
“Tamarack,” L. pendula, prefers moist places, but 
like L. occidentalis, is sometimes exceedingly pretty, 
and distinct from the pendulous European larch. L. 
Davurica, a Siberian kind, extends northward until it 
stunts to a mere shrub. L. leptolepis, which some say 
is the true Kaempfer larch, has the brightest of yellow 
foliage in autumn. It also becomes shrubby on the 
higher mountains of Japan and retains its terminal 
cones for two or three years. The larch from the 
Bhootan Himalaya, L. Griffithii, has not proven of 
ornamental value in Britain. Pseudolarix Kaempferi, 
“the golden larch of China,” is monotypic. It is bright 
green and pretty in its spring dress and should be 
planted before the buds swell, like all larches. It is 
said to attain to 100. feet and more in China, but seed 
is difficult to import, and grafted plants often seem 
to stunt. James MacPherson. 
