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688 the boundary line into Oregon. Buds scaly. Leaves on lateral branches linear and in two ranks in one plane. Bracts of pistillate flowers about twenty, usually with short points. Cones ripening in the first season ; scales abruptly enlarged into terminal discs.

2. Sequoia gigantea, Decaisne. Western slopes of the Sierra Nevada in California, Buds without scales. Leaves all radially arranged, spreading or slightly appressed, ovate or lanceolate. Bracts of pistillate flowers 25 to 30, with long points. Cones ripening in the second year; scales gradually thickening from the base to the apex.

A tree attaining 340 feet in height, with a slightly tapering and irregularly lobed trunk, occasionally 50 to 75 feet in girth above the enlarged and buttressed base. Bark six to twelve inches thick, divided into rounded ridges two or three feet in width, separating on the surface into long narrow fibrous scales, which on falling display the reddish-brown soft spongy fibro-cellular middle bark. Young trees pyramidal, with slender branches to near the base. Older trees in the forest with stems clean to 75 or 100 feet, the stout horizontal branches above forming an irregular narrow crown. Branchlets slender, green in the first year, gradually becoming afterwards brownish with a thin scaly bark, spreading in two ranks more or less in one plane. Buds solitary, both terminal and in the axils of two or three of the uppermost leaves, surrounded by loosely imbricated ovate acute scales, which remain persistent, dry, and brown at the base of the branchlets.

Leaves of two kinds: (1) on normal lateral branchlets, spreading in one plane in two ranks by a twist on their bases, ¼ to ¾ inch long, linear or lanceolate, ending in short cartilaginous points, slightly thickened on the revolute margins, narrowed at the base, where they become decurrent on the branchlets; upper surface dark green, with a median furrow; lower surface with a green midrib and two conspicuous whitish stomatic bands: (2) on leading branchlets, radially arranged in several ranks, appressed or spreading, about ¼ inch long, ovate or ovate-oblong, with incurved cartilaginous points; upper surface concave with a prominent green midrib and two whitish stomatic bands; lower surface rounded, indistinctly stomatiferous. Lateral branchlets with leaves of the latter kind may exceptionally occur on any part of the tree, and usually cover entire branches at the summit of