PICEA NOBILIS. 
7 
til 
fpreads until the whole plant has a rutty appearance, fo that we have heard it fpoken of as a ruft attacking 
the plant It is not fo, however; it is merely the ends of the leaves becoming brown by 
decay, and dropping off by mortification like a froft-bitten toe, and doubtlefs from the 
fame caufe, viz., defective circulation: how caufed is another queftion. This has been 
attempted to be accounted for in two ways: firft, by affuming that the feeds have been 
what is called “ imperfectly impregnated; ” or, fecond, by fuppofing that they have been 
fertilifed by the pollen of the common Silver Fir growing in company with the P. 
nobilis ■—in fhort, by fuppofing the young plants to be hybrids. As to the firft idea, we 
Fig. 20. Fig. 21. 
fcarcely know enough of the fecrets of the alembic of nature to be able to fay whether fuch a thing as 
imperfedt impregnation can or does exift; but we can underhand (what is probably meant by the phrafe) 
that, as in ordinary cafes, fome ovules arrive at perfection, and others do not; thofe which do, have had 
the energies of the plant mainly directed to them, and the others which do not, have had a lefs fhare of fuch 
vital influence. So, in a plant placed in uncongenial circumftances, the energies direCted to the ovules may 
never be fufficient to give them their full fhare of vitality, and hence may produce plants of a weakly confti- 
tution, and the refult be fomething, perhaps, refembling in nature the difference between a home-born 
Englifhman and one born in America or Auftralia of Englifh parents. This decay has hitherto been 
remarked only in plants produced from home-grown feed, and has been obferved in them even when grown 
under exaClly the fame conditions as plants raifed from feed of foreign growth, and it has hence been fup- 
pofed to be congenital; but it would appear that this is not the cafe; for during the wet feafons of 1861 and 
1862, we have had old grafted plants fuffer in their leaves in precifely the fame manner. It may, however, be 
objeCted to this exception, that grafted plants are liable to the fame fufpicion of weaknefs as home-grown 
feed, being like them produced in an abnormal manner, or at leaft under circumftances different from thofe 
provided for them by nature. Regarding the fecond theory of the difeafe—viz., that the feedlings from 
home-grown feeds are hybrids—it may be mentioned that the difeafe, fo far as yet afcertained, firft fhewed 
itfelf in plants produced from feeds grown at Elvafton, thefe being the firft feeds produced in this country. 
This gave rife to an unfounded report that, when the trees at Elvafton began to bear cones, Mr Barron, 
under whofe able charge the plantations were, finding no male cones, fupplied their abfence by dufting them 
with a branch of Silver Fir well charged with male catkins. The beft refutation of this report is, that the 
difeafe alfo appears in nurferies where home-grown feed not procured from Elvafton has been ufed. The 
following remarks on the fubjeCt, underftood to be from the pen of the Rev. M. J. Berkeley, one of the ableft 
vegetable phyfiologifts in Britain, appeared in the “Gardeners’ Chronicle,” Jan. 18, 1862: “A moft extra¬ 
ordinary cafe of bad conftitution in home-produced feedlings of A bies nobilis has lately been fent to us by 
Mr Murray from the Royal Horticultural Society. A confiderable portion of plants raifed from home- 
ripened feed are affeCled by a peculiar chlorofis, at firft confined to the tips of the leaves, but gradually 
increafing downwards and ultimately caufing death, when they are attacked by a minute fpecies of Phoma, 
which is, however, an after-growth, and not the primary caufe of evil. The condition of the buds, indeed, 
apparently refembles that which occurs in the common Silver Fir, when affedted by the fungus that 
caufes the Witches’ Befoms (Hexen-befen) which are fo common in the German forefts, and which 
occafionally make their appearance in this country. But there is no identity of caufe, nor, as in that 
cafe, does the chlorofis extend when the buds expand through the whole length of the leaf. The cafe 
appears to us decidedly to be one of conftitutional weaknefs arifing from propagation in a climate where 
the conditions are fuch as are not favourable to perfedfc development; and it is probable that feedlings 
from thefe difeafed plants, fhould they ever have vigour enough to bear fruit, will have the evil in an 
aggravated form. We have ourfelves proved, in the cafe of annuals, that where the parent plant is 
chlorotic, the produce is liable to a fimilar condition year after year, and there is no reafon why the fame 
condition fhould not hold good in plants of longer duration. It is evident that in fuch a cafe there 
is no remedy. Original weaknefs of conftitution may admit, under fcientific treatment, of palliation, but 
a found and healthy flock will fcarcely ever be derived, except poffibly by crofting, from one which is 
originally weak, or deficient in the conditions effential to health.” 
[ 1 ] 
We 
