516 
may also be propagated by seeds in the same way as the others; but if the seeds are not taken from 
trees growing in the neighbourhood of the male, they will not grow; and if they are kept out of the 
ground till the spring following. When these plants have obtained strength, some of them may be 
turned out of the pots, and planted against warm walls; where, if their branches are trained against 
the walls, they will endure the ordinary winters very well, and with a little shelter in severe winters 
they may be preserved. 
Genus 30. Plantanus. Plane Tree, Class XXI. Monoecia. 
Order VII. Polyandria. 
Species 1. Oriental Pla?ie Tree . (Platanus Orientalis.) 
The oriental Plane-tree grows naturally in Asia, where it becomes very large; the stem is tall, 
erect, and covered with a smooth bark, which annually falls off; it sends out many side branches, 
which are generally a little crooked at their joints; the bark of the young branches is of a dark 
brown, inclining to a purple colour; the leaves are placed alternate, on foot-stalks an inch and a 
half long; the leaves themselves are seven inches long and eight broad, deeply cut into five seg¬ 
ments, and the two outer are slightly cut again into two more; these segments have many acute 
indentures on their borders, and have each a strong midrib, with many lateral veins running to the 
sides; the upper side of the leaves is of a deep green, and the under side pale. The flowers come 
out upon long peduncles hanging downward, each sustaining five or six round balls of flowers; the 
upper, which are the largest, are more than four inches in circumference; these sit very close to 
the peduncle. The flowers are so small as scarce to be distinguished without glasses; they come 
out a little before the leaves, which is the beginning of June; and in warm summers the seeds will 
ripen late in autumn, and if left upon the trees will remain till spring, when the balls fall to pieces, 
and the bristly down which surrounds the seeds, helps to transport them to a great distance with 
the wind. 
Du Roi remarks, that the leaves vary in figure, but are always smooth; and that the peduncles 
are brown. Pallas says, that the leaves, when young, are white-tomentose; but when old, the 
petioles only are so; that the peduncles are smooth; that it differs most from the Occidental Plane- 
tree in having scarcely any stipules on the adult branches; and that the wood is very hard, reddish 
with brownish-grey transverse streaks. 
Native of the Levant, and many other parts of Asia. On Mount Taurus, Athos, Macedonia, 
Lemnos, Crete, mostly near water.* In Persia and perhaps Georgia, where there are very hand¬ 
some trees, four yards in circumference; on Mount Caucasus, where it is very common, it takes the 
form of a large shrub; as the Armerican Plane does, in the gardens at St. Petersburgh.f 
The Plane-tree has always been much esteemed in the Eastern countries, where it grows natu¬ 
rally, for its beauty, and grateful shade. Evelyn, Miller, and Gilpin have related at length, from 
Mian, the adoration that was paid by Xerxes, to a tree of this sort in Phrygia. And wherever 
any sumptuous buildings were erected iu that country, the porticoes, which opened to the air, 
generally terminated in groves of lines of these trees. 
It was no less esteemed in Italy after it was introduced there. Pliny informs us, that it was 
* Linn. 
■f Pallas. 
