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196 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland
According to Komaror, Flora Manshuritz, i . 206 (1901), Thuya japonica grows
wild abundantly in northern Corea in the Samsu district, but was not observed by
him in Manchuria or elsewhere on the mainland.
This tree is not, so far as I saw, as common in Japan, where it is called
Nezuko, as Cupressus obtusa or C. pisifera, though it is said by Goto 1 to be
found in the provinces of Yamato, Bungo, Satsuma, Omi, Iwashiro, Shimotsuke, and
Uzen, at an elevation of from about 3000 to 6000 feet.
The only place where I saw it wild was at Yumoto, above Nikko, where it was
scattered in mixed forest with Tsuga, Thujopsis, birches, and other deciduous trees,
and it is said to be never found in unmixed woods. At Koyasan I found small trees
of it, perhaps planted, and brought away a seedling, which is now living at
Colesborne.
At Atera, in the Kisogawa district, the forester told me that it grows best as a
young tree in shade, and that where Cupressus obtusa has been felled it often comes
up from seed. It does not attain very large dimensions, so far as I could learn, and
is not considered a tree of much economic importance.
The timber is light and used for carpentry. It sometimes has a very pretty
figure, and in old trees is of a pale grey colour, though perhaps this is only assumed
by trees which were dead before cutting. It is cut into thin boards, and used for
ceilings and other inside work, and is said to cost about 2 6.. per square foot in
the board at Tokyo, and to make very durable shingles.
In Great Britain the tree seems to grow slowly, and is not common in gardens.
The largest I have seen is a grafted and very spreading tree in Mr. W. H. Griffiths'
garden at Campden, Gloucestershire, which is about 25 feet by 2\ feet, and probably
one of the oldest in England. It has produced fertile seeds from which plants
have been raised. The largest recorded at the Conifer Conference was at Dalkeith
Palace, where it was 15 feet high in 1891. A tree at Kilmacurragh, co. Wicklow,
Ireland, was 24 feet by 2 feet 4 inches in 1906, and bears fruit. Another at
Castlewellan measured 25 feet high in the same year. (H. J. E.)
1 Forestry of Japan ( 1904).
Thuya 197
THUYA ORIENTALIS, CHINESE ARBOR VITVE
Thuya orientalis, Linnaeus, Sp. PL 1 002 (1753); London, Arb. et Frut. Brit. ^.2459(1838);
Masters, Jour. Linn. Soc. (Hot.) xviii. 488; Kent, in Veitch's Man. Coniferce, 248 (1900).
Biota orientalis, Endlicher, Syn. Conif. 4 7 (1847).
A tree or dense shrub, with the trunk often branching into several stems from
near the base. Bark of trunk thin, reddish brown, and separating in longitudinal
papery scales. The bark begins to scale on branches which are about a half inch in
thickness. The branches are ascending, becoming tortuose at their extremities,
and giving off more or less equal-sided branch-systems, which are disposed in
vertical planes, with their inner edge directed towards the stem of the tree. These
are finer and more closely ramified than in the preceding species. Their main axes
are terete; bearing median leaves, marked by a glandular longitudinal depression,
and ending in triangular free points (not appressed to the axis); and lateral leaves,
ending in similar but longer free points, which are thickened at the part where they
become free and reflected away from the axis. The leaves on the ultimate branchlets
are closely imbricated, appressed to the stem, and marked with longitudinal de
pressions.
The male flowers are globose and composed of 4 decussate pairs of stamens.
The cones 1 are erect and ovoid, fleshy and bluish before ripening, but
ultimately becoming dry and woody, the scales gaping widely. Scales, usually
3 pairs (occasionally a fourth pair, sterile and much reduced, appears at the base),
the two lowest fertile, the uppermost pair aborted and sterile: ovate, obtuse, thick,
and ligneous, bearing externally below the apex a hooked process. The seeds,
2 on each scale, are large, ovoid, without wings, brown in colour, with a white, large,
oblong hilum.
The seedling 2 resembles that of the other species of Thuya, except that the
cotyledons are much larger, about an inch in length.
VARIETIES
A great number of varieties of this species have been obtained. The most
remarkable of these are :
i. Var. pendula, Masters, Jour. R. Hort. Soc. xiv. 252.
Thuya pendula, Lambert, Genus Pinus, ed. 2, ii. 115 t. 5 2; Siebold et Zuccarini, Fl. Jap.
ii. 30 t. 117.
Thuya filiformis, Lindley, Bot. Reg. xxviii. t. 20 (1842).
Biota pendula, Endlicher, Syn. Conif. 49.
Cupressus pendula, Thunberg, Fl. Jap. 2 65.
1 The cones ripen in one year, but frequently in England retain their seed till the spring of the following year.
1 Tubcuf, Samcn, Friichtc, u. Kcimliiige, 104, fig. 144 (1891).