64 
THE MANUAL OF GARDENING. 
or Californian, has recently been discovered byNuttall, in Upper 
California. “At first view,” observes Mr. Nnttall in his supple- 
ment to the North American Sylva, where a beautiful drawing is 
given, “it would be taken for the ordinary species, spreading out 
the same serpentine picturesque limbs, occasionally denuded of 
their old coat of bark, and producing the same wide and gigantic 
trunk, but a glance at the leaves no less than the fruit, would re- 
mind the eastern traveller that he sojourned in a new region of 
vegetation, and objects apparently the most familiar he met 
around him, associate them as he would, were still wholly stran- 
gers. 
The leaves not fully expanded were about 4 inches wide and 
the same in length, divided more than half way down into five 
sharp pointed, lanceolate portions, of which the two lower are 
the smallest; all the divisions are quite entire, two of them in 
small leaves are suppressed, thus producing a leaf of only three 
parts. Above, as usual, the surface is at first clad with a yellow- 
ish copious down, formed of ramified hairs, which quickly falls 
off and spreads itself in the atmosphere. The under surfaces of 
the leaves are, however, always copiously clad with a coat of 
whitish wool, which remains. The young leaves, clad in their 
brown pilose clothing, have a very uncommon appearance, and 
feel exactly like a piece of stout thick woollen cloth. 
The wood of this species, as far as I could learn from the 
American residents at St. Barbara, is far preferable to that of the 
common Buttonwood, being much harder, more durable, less lia- 
ble to warp, and capable of receiving a good polish ; it is of a 
pale yellowish colour, like the young wood of the Oriental 
Plane, and bears some resemblance to beech wood in its texture. 
In the radiation of its medullary vessels, it resembles the wood 
of the common species.” 
The Oriental Plane, P. orientalis , bears some resemblance to 
the common American, but on comparison, the difference is easily 
observed. We have searched in vain on this species for the dis- 
ease so prevalent on the common one ; henceforth, therefore, should 
the disease continue, it will be more prudent to plant the orien- 
talis; the following description of it is copied from Nuttall: 
“ The Oriental Plane ( Platanus Orientalis ) deserves to be 
planted in the United States as an ornamental tree. It grows to 
the height of from 70 to 90 feet, with widely spreading branches 
and a massive trunk, forming altogether a majestic object. The 
leaves are more deeply divided and indented than in our com- 
mon species. A native of the East, where shady trees are not 
so abundant as in. North America, it was celebrated in the earli- 
est records of Grecian history. Xerxes, it seems, (according to 
Herodotus,) was so fascinated with a beautiful Plane tree which 
he found growing in Lycia, that he encircled it with a ring of 
