Page:Aspects of nature in different lands and different climates; with scientific elucidations (IA b29329668 0002).pdf/182

 *[Footnote: testify in favour of such a succession. The Dammara orientalis of Borneo and Java, often above ten feet in diameter, was first called loranthifolia; and Dammara australis (Lamb.) of New Zealand, which is 140 (149 English) feet high, was first called zamæfolia. In both these species of trees the leaves are not needles, but "folia alterna oblongo-lanceolata, opposita, in arbore adultiore sæpe alterna, enervia, striata." The under surface of the leaves is thickly set with porous openings. This passage or transition of the appendicular system from the greatest contraction to a broad-leaved surface, like all progression from simple to compound, has at once a morphological and a physiognomic interest (Link, Urwelt, Th. I. 1834, S. 201-211). The short-stalked, broad, cleft leaf of the Salisburia (Kämpfer's Gingko) has also its breathing pores only on the under side of the leaf. The original native country of this tree is unknown to us. By the connection and intercourse of Buddhistic communities it early passed from the temple-gardens of China to those of Japan.

In travelling from a port on the Pacific to Mexico, on our way to Europe, I witnessed the singular and painful impression which the first sight of a pine forest near Chilpanzingo made on one of our companions, who, born at Quito under the equinoctial line, had never seen needle trees, or trees with "folia acerosa." It seemed to him as if the trees were leafless; and he thought that as we were travelling towards the cold North, he already recognised in this extreme contraction of the vegetable organs the chilling and impoverishing influence of the pole. The traveller]*