Part III. ] R. S. Hole : Useful Exotics in Indian Forests. 5 
and intensity of the factors of the environment may so 
change the characters of the plants and the quality of 
their commercial products as to render them of compar¬ 
atively little value. Thus, in one locality, fast grown 
timber with a large proportion of “ spring-wood” may he 
produced, while, in another locality, slow-growing timber 
with a large proportion of dense “ autumn-wood 33 will 
be developed which is of higher value for many purposes. 
The only way of avoiding this difficulty is to see that, 
so far as possible, each plant is grown under conditions 
similar to those to which it is accustomed in its native 
country. Although the omission to ascertain these con¬ 
ditions frequently leads, not only to deterioration in 
value, but even more frequently to the death of the 
plants, the importance of this point is frequently over¬ 
looked and waste of time and money necessarily results. 
Thus Eucalyptus Globulus , Labill., is well known to be one of the least 
hardy of the more valuable species of the genus and yet it is probably 
still one of the most frequently planted and often in localities totally un¬ 
suited to it. As a general rule it may be said that, other things equal, 
plants possessing xerophilous chapters and which develop well in a 
strongly xerophytic habitat are most likely to withstand both frost and 
drought. Regarding the natural habitat of E. Globulus , Yon 
Mueller wrote as follows in 1880 : “ in valleys as well as on ridges and 
mountain-slopes, chiefly in humid regions * * not ascending to alpine 
elevations/'’ 1 This obviously does not sound like a xerophytic habitat 
and should have been a sufficient warning to prevent its introduction 
into such localities. Again the same author l.c. notes: “it (i,e. } 
Eucalyptus alpina) will endure such severe frosts, as at once would 
prove detrimental to E. Globulusf and te E. Globulus among tall 
congeners cannot rival E . paucifiora , E. amygdalina and E. Gunnii 
in hardiness.” Experiments with E. Globulus in the Simla Division 
of the Punjab (1903—07) showed that this species was “ particularly 
susceptible to the effect of frost and drought , 33 but even now 
proposals are sometimes made to introduce this species into the 
extremely xerophytic forest-locked grasslands of our plain-forests. 
The policy frequently followed with reference to the cultivation of 
Eucalyptogrciphia, Decade VI. 
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