6 
PINETUM BRITANNICUM. 
odds, and Mr Douglaf’s courage need moult no feather although he did make a precipitate retreat when no 
man purfued. But, feated quietly at our own firefide, and reflecting on the circumftances with the light 
which we now poffefs, from our greater knowledge of the habits of the natives, we may venture to fay that, 
had Douglas kept his ground and waited their return, he would have been agreeably furprifed by finding 
them bearing a large fupply of the feeds ready flielled. Their ready and unanimous departure indicates a 
defined objedt, which they knew they could accomplifh. It was not to difperfe to fearch and climb for 
cones, which were growing on the trees around them ; but, poffeffmg plenty of the feeds in their lodges, 
they rufhed off, with the one-ideaed impetuofity of a fchoolboy, to procure the defired article. When Mr 
William Murray, in one of his expeditions (1854), looked about for fome fhorter and lefs expenfive mode 
of procuring the feed of P. Lambertiana than cutting down thefe enormous trees, he found that he could 
obtain them in quantity, ready fhelled, from the natives for fome trifling recompenfe ; and actually thus 
procured and brought away with him feveral pecks of the feed in the fineft order. But, even fuppofing 
that Douglas by waiting might have received a good fupply of the feeds, the queftion remains, whether, 
after the interchange of tobacco for feeds was over, fome new ruling idea might not have feized the group, 
to be followed with equally unreafoning vehemence—fuch as the beauty of his gun and piftols, and their 
peculiar fitnefs for themfelves. Douglas, therefore, undoubtedly exercifed a wife difcretion in diftrufting 
the impulfes of thefe “ children of nature.” In fubfequent letters, written fome years afterwards, he men¬ 
tions that in each of the two years following the incident above related, a party of whites had been maf- 
facred by the Indians of that diftridl; in one of them only one individual efcaping to tell the tale. 
The name “ Lambertiana” was given to it by Douglas in honour of Mr Aylmer Bourke Lambert, 
of Boyton Houfe, near Heytefbury, Wilts, who was the laft furvivor of the original members of the Lin- 
nsean Society, and for nearly fifty years one of its Vice-Prefidents. He was born in 1761. Prom his 
college days to his death, in 1842, he was ardently attached to the ftudy of natural fcience, and amaffed 
one of the largeft botanical collections then in exiftence. He is chiefly interefting to the ftudents of 
Coniferae from having publifhed the magnificent work intitled “ A Defcription of the Genus Pinus,” 
cited above. It was firft publifhed in London, in 1803, in folio, and a fupplementary volume in 1825 ; and 
is one of the moft fplendid botanical publications that ever iffued from the prefs. A fecond edition, with 
additions, was publifhed in 1828, and a third volume was added in 1834. A fmaller edition, in imperial 
oCtavo, was publifhed in 1832. This is compofed of the fame matter as the 1828 edition, and the plates 
feem to be excifed portions of the larger plates, crowded together in a fmaller compafs. It is right to add 
that the chief part of the defcriptions in that work was executed by Mr Don, who was for many years 
curator of Mr Lambert’s collection and library. 
Introduced into Europe in 1827. 
Properties and U/es .—The timber, as already mentioned, is foft, white, ftraight in the grain, and 
homogeneous. In California it is efteemed beyond all other Pines for “ infide work,” fuch as floors, doors, 
and house carpentry in general. 
The juice or refin is white and semi-tranfparent, crumbly, and not very tenacious. Where a tree has 
been partially burnt, the refin which exudes from it feems thereby to have its properties altered. It in a 
greater meafure lofes its terebinthine tafte and fmell, and acquires a fweetifh tafte like fugar, whence the name 
(Sugar Pine) which the tree has received from the fettlers. It is fometimes ufed by them for fweetening their 
food, but more frequently as a medicine than a condiment, on account of the decided cathartic properties 
which it poffeffes. Its refemblance in tafte, appearance, and properties to manna is very clofe; as Dr 
Newberry fays, “but for a flight terebinthine flavour, it might be fubftituted for that drug without the 
knowledge of the druggift or phyfician, its phyfical and medical properties are fo very like.” Dr Lyon 
Playfair, Profeffor of Chemiftry in the Univerfity of Edinburgh, has had the kindnefs to analyfe a portion 
of it, and found it all but identical in its properties with manna, although the portion placed at his difpofal 
was too fmall to allow him to make a reliable quantitative analyfis. According to Berthelot ( Compt . Rend. 
1855 , 
