NaiunalEisiey tel Collections: 295 
dertaken.to determine the height of the peaks of the Himmaleh ; the English 
naturalists found this tree flourishing with the Indian chestnut, in shrubby wood, 
4000 yards above the level of the sea; and this explains how a tropical shrub re- 
sists in our country the most intense cold, and is enabled to propagate itself as 
far as the freezing zone of Iceland and Greenland. 
I myself “‘ says M. Dureau de la Malle,”’. have discovered the cradle of two 
species of trees very common in our towns, the lime tree known by the name 
of wild lime, (Tilia sylvestris), and lime tree of Holland, (Tilia platyphyllos.) 
Ina voyage made to the Pyrenees in the year 1807, I found near the port of 
Gavarnie at 2000 yards above the level of the sea, in the midst of the most sterile 
rocks, which men had never endeavoured to subject to cultivation, these two limes 
growing in low wood, or as isolated trees, by the side of the primitive forests, 
and shrub-wood of pines and Rhododendrons.—Annales des Sciences Nat. 
June 1829, 
On the Duration of the Germinative Power of the Seeds of Plants, par- 
ticularly of the Cucurbitacee.—The Society for the encouragement of horticul- 
ture in Prussia, proposes from time to time certain questions, to which it directs 
the attention of horticulturists. 
The following is selected from a recent date :—“ Is it true that the seeds of 
the melon and cucumber, being preserved for some years, yield a greater abun- 
dance of fruit ?”. Most obsrevers remark that the plants obtained from the seeds 
of the preceding year produce many leaves, but. few fruitful flowers, and al- 
most entirely male ones ; but that these same seeds, dried by the heat of the 
sun, or of a stove, yield more fruitful plants, and that it is particularly at the 
end of some years they acquire this property. These experiments vary from 
three to twenty years. The heat of the human body may be useful, but it 
must be used with discretion, or the germinative power of the seeds will be des- 
troyed. 
The author of this article has made experiments of the same kind on balsams 
and gillyflowers. He sowed at the same time some seeds of the last, some of which 
were of the preceding year, others of some years previous. The first came up much 
sooner than the second, and gave only simple flowers; the others produced only 
sixteen out of several hundred plants. 
M. Schmidt employs seed from five to twelve years old ; those of twenty years 
did not grow. Professor Sprengel of Halle says he obtained no fruit from seed a 
year old. M. d’Arenstorff, of Drebleau, obtained fruit, most remarkable for their 
flavour and size, from seed of twenty years old. The observations of Professor 
Treviranus, of Berlin, have afforded the same result. A vigorous vegetation pro- 
duces, in moneecious plants, male flowers in the greatest abundance, sometimes 
even exclusively. This has been proved, as far as regards the Cucurbitacee ; 
but seeds, which are too old, produce an opposite result. He has seen seeds of 
‘five years old produce only female flowers ; they were fecundated by male flowers 
‘of another bed, and yielded fruit. 
M. Voss, head gardener at Sans Souci, sowed on the 7th of F ebruary, 1827, 
twenty-four seeds of a Spanish melon of the year 1799, being consequently thirty- 
seven years old, and he obtained eight plants which gave good fruit. ‘This ex- 
periment, the most remarkable of all, will excuse our citing eleven others which 
“he made with seed of a less age, and of different species. Cucumber seeds of seven- 
teen years old afforded the same results. M. Voss adds, that some seeds of the 
alcea rosea, of twenty-three years old, afforded very well conditioned plants. 
** We admit, as incontestable, the above-mentioned observations. It is known 
that the seeds of different families retain for a greater or less time, their germina- 
tive power ; to cite only one example from among the leguminous plant,—about 
twenty years since, we believe, fruit was obtained in the Royal Garden from a 
species of Phaseolus or Dolichos, taken in the herbarium of Tournefort.”— 
Verhandl. des Vereins zur Beferd, des Gurtenbaurs in den Preuss. Siaat. 
YOL. I, ar 
