CEDRUS LIBANI 
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conditions of existence, and the further corollary that difference in character is equivalent to difference 
in condition. If we suppose the same tree to have originally spread more or less continuously from Mount 
Atlas to the Himmalayas, while the climate of all that tract of land was uniform, it is consistent with 
other facts to infer that it must at that time have been everywhere the same variety ; but while such 
an inference may be drawn, it is modified by the fact that, even when the species is growing under identical 
conditions, seedling varieties occur, some of which survive and spread. 
The advance, duration, and retreat of the Glacial epoch was accompanied by great geological changes; 
but we can easily suppose that the very universality and uniformity of the resulting conditions must have 
produced a uniform climate, not only in the lands immediately subject to the direct influence of much cold, 
but also in those in their vicinity indirectly exposed only to loss of heat in a minor degree; consequently, 
any change which such alteration of climate may have produced on the Cedar being universal, would affect 
the whole, and still preserve the species as one, although perhaps a different one from the Miocene type. 
Extremes of heat or cold are equally unfavourable to the occurrence of variety of conditions: it is the vacil¬ 
lation between heat and cold which produces change of condition. After the retreat of the cold, variety of 
condition and climate would more naturally occur than during its continuance; and it is to the change 
consequent on the different nature of the localities in which the Cedars found themselves after its retreat, 
that we think that the alteration of the Cedar of Lebanon into the Deodar, or vice versa , must have taken 
place. It was not until the recess of the Glacial epoch that we imagine this change took place. Until 
the present geological features of the different stations of the Cedar had been developed, the present climatal 
conditions of each did not exist. Now, if change in form really arises from a change taking place in condi¬ 
tion, it should follow that, where the species is under identical conditions, no alteration in form should be 
observable, with the reservations already set forth, while, where the conditions are different, the form should 
differ too, and that the greater the difference in condition, the greater should be the difference in appearance. 
In accordance with our theory of the change of form being caused by transition from one condition of 
life to a different one, we should expect what is actually the case—viz., that those Cedars which subsist 
under the most nearly identical condition should be most nearly alike; while that which dwells under the 
most unlike conditions should be most distinct; and, at the same time, as the conditions of life of all are 
still very similar, that no great difference should exist between any. A remark by Prof. Alphonse de 
Candolle, on the disposition shewn by the Cedar to naturalise itself at Geneva, may be fairly quoted in 
support of this view. 
“Some trees seem to have a disposition to naturalise themselves, in the true sense of the word. The Cedar ( Cedrus Libani ) is in this case. 
I see it springing up from seeds at Geneva, in the meadows bordering old trees of its species ; and it appears to me that it would succeed, were it 
not that the scythes of the workmen generally destroy it. Other Conifers often cultivated are in the same predicament. One cannot, however, 
accept as of any value the assertion of authors, who call a tree naturalised when it has been planted or sown in quantity, and grows well in a 
park, or in forests made by man. A species might, in this case, give good seed without naturalising itself, as the wheat, the Indian corn, the 
potato, and so many other plants do which are cultivated on a general scale, and which do not establish themselves in Europe, notwithstanding 
the abundance and perfect quality of their seeding.” ( Geogr. Botanique Raisonee, ii. p. 741.) 
But the self-sowing of the Cedar at Geneva he does not put in this category ; and, according to our 
view, seeing the similarity between the climate, both of the Taurus, Lebanon, and Mount Atlas, and that 
of Central Europe, there seems no reason why the tree should not establish itself in the latter, if a fair 
opportunity were given it to do so. 
The foregoing is our notion of the way in which the distribution of the Cedars has been brought 
about; but we must not forget that there are other hypotheses, whereby the geographical sundering of the 
three kinds of Cedars has been attempted to be accounted for. We need, however, to draw attention 
only to that of Sir Joseph Hooker, which has been already cited in our description of the Deodar, 
to which the reader is referred. Leaving him otherwise to form his own conclusions as to the 
causes of the present distribution of the Cedars, we shall now turn to the history of the trees of 
Lebanon, since the time that man has first left record of them, and endeavour to ascertain how 
far 
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