PINUS BUNGEANA 
O 
inhabited and cultivated country can well be. In summer the country, although treeless, is not without 
vegetation. Its plains are covered with crops of a kind of millet—a tall Sorghum, from 6 to 9 feet high, 
with a hard stem as thick as a man’s thumb, which in autumn is cut about knee-high, and which did 
infinite damage to the legs of our cavalry horses in the Pekin war; and the gardens and neighbourhood 
of the houses of the inhabitants are gay with flowers and shrubs. But in winter all is changed : the crops 
being cut down, the plains are one extensive stubble; not a plant nor a tree to break the uniform desolate 
sameness is to be seen so far as the eye can reach, all the shrubs and plants having disappeared. Where 
they can have gone to at first appears inexplicable; but on inquiry it turns out that they have been taken 
up and carried in pots into outhouses, into cellars, and holes under ground, and wherever shelter can be 
obtained from the severity of the coming storm, which would otherwise kill them all. The hardiest ever¬ 
green cannot unprotected stand that piercing climate. Passing through these inhospitable regions to the 
mountains to the west, Mr. Fortune first met with this Pine, in its native country and full grown. In the 
south he had often seen small plants in pots, and knew the tree perfectly; but when he saw the strange 
aspect of the tree with its white leaves, as above described, he naturally rejoiced at the discovery of a new 
species. It was only when he came up to it that he found it was an old acquaintance. Being almost 
confined to cemeteries, and in such a treeless country, its lofty, white, many-pillared columns, so associated, 
formed an impressive and striking object. 
Properties and Uses .—Not yet known to possess any peculiar economic value not possessed by the 
whole family of Pines. 
/ 
Culture .—Looking at the bitter cold of the country from which this species comes, it was of course to 
be expected that it would prove hardy in our own milder climate, and so it has proved. It stood the cold 
of the winter of 1860-61, as well as those of 1878-79, 1880-81, uninjured, and seems to be tolerably rapid 
in its growth. 
2S. 
Commercial Statistics — Price of young plants in 1862, 10s. 6d. to 15s. ; 
to 7s. 6d. 
[ 37 ] 
in 1872, 5s. to 10s. ; 
in 1882, 
B 
