elsewhere, It is much more affected by climate and aspect than by soil, and seeks the most humid and mildest situations. In the Killarney basin it occupies practically the whole northern shore of the northern lake, but does not grow on the exposed islands of this lake. It is absent from the shore itself, when this is marshy or composed of shingle or sand, and grows on the rocky headlands, where it forms a natural wood with oak, holly, and mountain ash. It is very common on the long indented promontory of Muckross, and reaches its greatest dimensions on Dinis Island, which is perhaps the dampest and most sheltered spot in the whole district, protected by high mountains on the east and west, but open to the south. It usually does not extend far from the lake shore, but in the very humid and shaded Tore ravine it recedes into the general woodland along the rocky banks of the torrent, and ascends to an elevation of several hundred feet. It flourishes also on the rocky and sheltered islands of the southern lake.
In dense woods it has a fairly straight and single trunk; but in the open it usually divides at a short distance from the ground into two or more stems, which tend to be spirally twisted and are often curved, each of them terminating in a much-branched wide crown of foliage. The bark of old trees scales off in longitudinal strips and becomes purplish-grey in colour, assuming in the sunlight a reddish tinge, resembling in this respect the branchlets, which are pale-green on the shaded side and crimson on the sunny side.
The largest trees seen by me were about 4o feet in height; one had three stems 4 feet 10 inches, 4 feet 3 inches, and 3 feet 2 inches in girth respectively, the butt measuring close to the ground 17 feet round. Plate 157 represents one of the finest of these trees on Dinis island. Major Waldron has recently found trees up to 5 feet 7 inches in girth. Much larger trees existed formerly, as one measured by Mackay in 1805, which was 9½ feet in girth, The Arbutus woods, like those of Kerry generally, suffered much from the ironworks, which were established in the eighteenth century, and the largest trees were cut down at this period.
Introduction
The date of the introduction of the Arbutus into English gardens is unknown; but Mrs. J.R. Green has kindly sent me the following extract from the State Papers,[1] showing that its existence in Kerry attracted in the sixteenth century the attention of the English settlers, who called it wollaghan, a corruption of ubhla caithne (pronounced oolacahney), or "arbutus apples," a name used for the edible fruit:—
"You shall receive herewith a bundle of trees called wollaghan tree, whereof my Lord of Leicester and Mr. Secretary Walsingham are both very desirous to have some, as well for the fruit as the rareness of the manner of bearing, which is after the kind of the orange, to have blossoms and fruit green or ripe all the year long, and the same of a very pleasant taste, and growing nowhere else but in one part of Munster, from whence I have caused them to be transported immediately unto you,
- ↑ Cal. State Papers, Ireland, A.D. 1586, p. 240.
