tetragonal; stamens sixteen to twenty. Cones on very slender branchlets (which are modified in being tetragonal, with minute appressed leaves uniform in the four ranks), about ¾ inch long, purplish or dark brown, roughened externally by longitudinal ridges; scales six, resembling those of L. decurrens, but smaller and with blunter minute processes. Seed, one on each of the two middle scales; two-winged, with the larger wing broader in the middle and more obtuse than in the Californian species.
This species occurs in the forests of Southern Yunnan in China, at 4000 to 5000 feet, but is rarely met with wild, and only in ravines near water-courses. It was discovered by Anderson near Hotha in 1888; and was subsequently seen by me wild, near Talang, and frequently planted in temples. It is known to the Chinese in Yunnan as Poh or Peh; and the wood is much esteemed, especially that of logs often found buried, the result of inundations in past times. Specimens of this species, so far as one can judge by the foliage alone, have been sent to Kew from North Formosa by Bourne.
The Chinese Libocedrus was introduced by Mr. E.H. Wilson, who collected seeds when he was paying me a visit at Szemao in the autumn of 1899. Young plants,[1] raised at the Coombe Wood Nursery, have beautiful, glaucous, large, flat foliage, the apices of the leaves being tipped with very fine, long, cartilaginous points. They may also be seen in the temperate house at Kew. The tree would probably be hardy in Cornwall and the south-west of Ireland, and being highly ornamental, is worth a trial in warm, sheltered spots. (A.H.)
LIBOCEDRUS DECURRENS, Incense Cedar
- Libocedrus decurrens, Torrey, Smithsonian Contrib. vi. 7, t. 3 (1854); Sargent, Silva N. Amer. x. 135, t. 534 (1896), and Trees N. Amer. 73 (1905); Kent, Veitch's Man. Coniferæ, 253 (1900); Mayr, Fremdländ. Wald- u. Parkbäume, 315 (1906).
- Thuya Craigana, Murray, Botan. Exped. Oregon, 2, t. 5 (1853).
- Thuya gigantea, Carrière, Rev. Hort. 1854, p. 224 (in part) (not Nuttall).
- Heyderia decurrens, Koch, Dendrologie, ii. 2, p. 179 (1873).
A tree, attaining in America 180 feet in height and 21 feet in girth, with a straight stem tapering from a broad base. Bark nearly an inch thick, light cinnamon-red, irregularly fissuring into ridges covered with appressed flat scales.
Leaves shining green, each set of four equal in length, adnate for most of their length to the branchlets, but free at the tips, which end in fine cartilaginous points; about ⅛ inch long on the conspicuously flattened secondary and tertiary axes, increasing to ½ inch on the main axes, which are only slightly flattened: those of the lateral ranks boat-shaped, gradually narrowing to an acuminate apex, keeled and glandular on the back, covering in part the median leaves, which are obscurely glandular and flattened, with broadly triangular cuspidate apices.
- ↑ A seedling is figured in Ann. of Bot. xvi. 557, fig. 30 (1902), concerning which Sir W. Thiselton Dyer says:—"The primitive leaves are not very different from the cotyledons, with which they are serially continuous; but after a time there is a complete change in the form and disposition of the foliar organs."
