Cypress tree

“ I do not wonder that the ancients, even aside from their superstitions, selected the cypress as an emblem of death and mourning—for no one can behold that tree in its native solitude and state without thinking of all the friends he had lost, and would be likely to lose for the next hundred years.—Picture to yourself, gentle reader, the bed of a sluggish stream, enriched by the accumulations of vegetable mould for unknown ages, until the water forced itself through a deep, narrow channel, winding hither and thither ”

“ A peculiarly gloomy look is lent to the Spanish landscape by the cypress, sometimes growing in groups, sometimes towering singly in solitude. This tree, funereal in its best aspect, has a dead, dry, white trunk, and the branches begin at a height of twenty, thirty, or forty feet, and then drape themselves in a cone-like monumental mass of purplish green. These gloomy evergreens are common, and the tourist feels, even if he does not note, the absence of the lively sunny greens of American and French landscapes, with the bowery shadows that everywhere invite the wayfarer to stop and rest. ”

“ The cypress-tree, though found in most of our old gardens, is at present much neglected: it deserves, however, to be more diligently cultivated, as it not only adds considerable beauty to wildernesses and groves, but also affords a valuable wood, which is aromatic, very compact, and heavy; is neither liable to decay or putrify, nor to the devastations of the worm, so that it is admirably calculated for chests, drawers, musical instruments, and other utensils. ”

“ The most surprising thing about the bald cypress is the flaring base of the trunk, and the root system which seems too large for the tall but usually narrow top. Knees of cypress rising out of the water from the main roots, are distinguished from stumps by their smooth, conical tops. The base of a great tree often spreads into wide flying buttresses, each hollowed on the inside, but serving with the others to support the hollow-trunked tree. Many a giant of great age stands thus on stilts whose submerged ends are the gnarled roots of the tree. ”

“ A single cypress stands yonder on the hill, kindled by the red glow of evening, like an altar taper. It is a tree that suits the hour and the mood—an Ave Maria tree, monumental as an obelisk, dark and mournful. Those avenues of cypresses leading to the cloisters and burying-grounds in Italy are very beautiful. We have the weeping-willow. ”

“ The American or Bald Cypress (Taxodium distichum) is a tree of considerable importance. It grows in the South Atlantic and Gulf States, on submerged lands or in deep swamps where unusual logging methods are necessitated. The seasoned wood resembles white cedar in that it is soft, light, and very durable. It has been called by many names. Pieces were once called black or white cypress according as they sank or floated. All dark pieces are now called black cypress. The tinted woods of some localities are called red or yellow cypress. ”

“ The wood of the European cypress is also used for many purposes where strength and durability are required, for it really seems never to wear out. This tree is described as tapering and cone-like, with upright branches growing close to the trunk, and in its general appearance a little resembling a poplar. Its frond-like branches are closely covered with very small sharp-pointed leaves of a yellow-green color, smooth and shining, and they remain on the tree five or six years. The cypress is often seen in burying-grounds in Europe, and in Turkey it often stands at each end of a grave. ”

“ And so the wonder tale revealeth that the proud Young Cypress, who gazeth with such shining eyes into those of his mother, is the noble shoot of a mighty tree whose shadow extendeth over the earth, and whose fame shall be sung by the Children of Ormuzd as long as the world lasts. ”

“ They grow directly out of the water and are famous for a peculiar formation of the roots called cypress knees,—lumpy growths which come up out of the water as if they were in search of air. The cypress is a tall, spirelike tree, which has the most delicate, feathery needles imaginable. ”

“ It is probable that the misnomer has been bestowed in ignorance of the fact that an uninjured tree is seldom met with, and that nearly every cypress has been mutilated for the sake of the strong tough leader, which, with one branch attached, will form the one-fluked anchor required for the roofs of native dwellings already described. In the absence of its leader the tree extends laterally, and becomes a Cupressus horizontalis. The wood of this species is extremely dense and hard, and when cut it emits a resinous and aromatic scent ”

“ Probably cypress which has not been disturbed by man is reproducing as well now as at any time in the past. The tree lives three or four centuries, and if it leaves one seedling to take its place it has done its part toward perpetuating the species. Fire, the mortal enemy of forests, seldom hurts cypress, because the undergrowth is not dry enough to burn. ”

“ The cypress and the umbrella-pine are not merely conventional types of the Italian landscape. They are essential elements in a field of rural beauty which can be seen in perfection only in the basin of the Mediterranean, and they are as characteristic of this class of scenery as is the date-palm of the oases of the Eastern desert. There is however, this difference: a single cypress or pine is often enough to shed beauty over a wide area; the palm is a social tree, and its beauty is not so much that of the individual as of the group. ”

“ The Monterey Cypress, a beautiful tree sometimes one hundred and fifty feet high and eight or ten feet in diameter, grows near the sea in California and three others occur on the Pacific Coast. The so-called Cypress or White Cedar of the Eastern States, and the Bald Cypress of southern swamps, valued for timber, are distant varieties of cypress.
Dogwood (Cornus) , is a shrub or small tree, the wood of which is exceedingly hard and is used for many purposes. The astringent bark and sometimes the leaves are used in medicine. There are about eighteen species in the United States. ”

“ The tradition is, that the cypress (being a symbol of mortality, ferales & invisas, they should say of the contrary) is never to be cut, for fear of killing it. This makes them to impale, and wind them about, like so many Ægyptian mummies; by which means, the inward parts of the tree being heated, for want of air and refreshment, it never arrives to any perfection, but is exceedingly troublesome, and chargeable to maintain; whereas indeed, there is not a more tonsile and governable plant in nature ”

“ The cruel north-west wind that heaped the snow above François Paradis at the foot of some desolate cypress bore also to her on its wings the frown and the harshness of the country wherein she dwelt, and filled her with hate of the northern winter, the cold, the whitened ground and the loneliness, of that boundless forest unheedful of the destinies of men where every melancholy tree is fit to stand in a home of the dead. ”

“ These Pines constitute a great part of the timber of the flat country between the mountains and the coast, and render a journey through that region singularly monotonous and gloomy. In the low grounds, a considerable proportion of the wood consists of the Southern Cypress, a graceful and magnificent tree, whose appearance would be very lively and cheerful, were it not for the abundance of long trailing "moss" (usnea) that hangs, like funereal drapery, from its branches, and darkens the whole forest. ”

“ There grew her father's cypress tree,
No other monument had he.
He bade that never funeral stone
Should tell of glory overthrown,—
What could it say, but foreign sky
Had seen the exile pine and die? ”

“ Far as the eye can see—far as the dim blue hills which mark the eastern horizon—the plain is flooded with leaves and blossoms. At closer view we shall recognize the fig and pomegranate, the mulberry, pistachio, peach, almond and apricot, the tall poplar and waving cypress and bending grape-vine and short, gnarled olive tree. ”

“ The fact that the deciduous cypress grows without difficulty on the moister class of lowlands in California, 12 or 15 feet above bottom water, is of interest in this connection. It then assumes the upland form shown in the figure above, although not growing quite as tall. The calcareous nature of these soils is probably an important factor in this apparently incongruous adaptation of a subtropical swamp tree to arid conditions. In its swamp form the cypress usually grows in rather shallow, heavy clay soil, into the dense subsoil of which the roots penetrate but little. ”

“ The White and Black Spruce are varieties of this genus.
Cypresses.—The Cypress is a very interesting tree, from its extraordinary dimensions, and the varied application of its wood. Its northern boundary is Indian river, in Delaware, in latitude about thirty-nine degrees. In proceeding southward, it becomes more abundant in the swamps, and in Louisiana those parts of the marshes where the cypress grows almost alone are called cypress swamps, and they sometimes occupy thousands of acres. ”

“ The odorous jasmin and the fragrant rose of Damascus have stolen their perfumes from thy breath. The loftiest cedar and the finest and most erect cypress esteem themselves happy when they see that they are the image of thy straight and lofty neck, and the palm-tree enviously, and in emulation, imitates thy stately stature. ”

“ On the other hand they say that bay and myrtle sometimes improve by seeding, though usually they degenerate and do not even keep their colour, but red fruit gives black—as happened with the tree in Antandros; and frequently seed of a 'female' cypress produces a 'male' tree. ”

“ I am informed that cypress trees have to be girdled in the spring and killed, so that they contain but little sap when cut in the fall, as, if cut green, they would sink in the water before they could be floated to the mill. ”

“ The white cedar, or cypress, is a very graceful tree which generally grows in swamps. 'It is entirely free from the stiffness of the pines, and to the spiry top of the poplar it unites the airy lightness of the hemlock. The trunk is straight and tall, tapering very gradually, and toward the top there are short irregular branches, forming a small but beautiful head, above which the leading shoot waves like a slender plume.' The leaves are very small and scale-like, with sharp points, and grow in four rows on the ends of the branchlets, giving them the appearance of large compound leaves. ”

“ Every tree—cypress, live-oak, sycamore, cotton-wood, or gum, all solemnly draped with black moss—had its scrawny phantom to toss and flicker fantastically with the tangled motion of a hundred darting arms, if the branches or their streamers swayed in the furnace-breath of the light wind. ”

“ This morning Jake, the boy and Doctor went out to a bayou after ducks, but saw none. This country is said to swarm with game but it keeps hidden from us. What a thing is a bad reputation!
In the woods we noted the buds springing from the roots of the cypress, the size of an egg, and growing upward in hollow cones, called cypress knees. It is a remarkable and noble tree, the buttressed stumps giving promise of superb height, which seems rarely realized. Half a mile back from the landing we came upon the levee, a great bank of earth but partly covered with grass. ”

“ If you affect to see your cypress in standard, and grow wild, (which may in time come to be of a large substance, fit for the most immortal of timber, and indeed are the least obnoxious to the rigours of our Winters, provided you never clip or disbranch them) plant of the reputed male-sort; it is a tree which will prosper wonderfully; and where the ground is hot and gravelly, though (as we said) he be nothing so beautiful ”

“ The Italian cypress is our most picturesque tree, and for combination with architecture, is unrivaled by any other tree. They grow rather slowly, but do not take much space, on account of their vertical habit. The making of the Court of Palms is due largely to the liberal use of these elegant trees, with their somber stateliness.
The lover of outdoors will find no end to his pleasurable investigations in the many fine, luxurious groupings of flowering shrubs. ”

“ South of the Caloosa-hatchie river, between the Everglades and the Gulf, extends the Big Cypress. This is a large swamp, fifty miles long and thirty-five miles broad. Here the saw-grass gives way to groves of cypress trees, with a rank and tangled undergrowth of vines. The soil is either bog or quicksand, generally covered one or two feet deep with stagnant water. The sun’s rays rarely penetrate the dense foliage, and on the surface of the water floats a green slime, which, when disturbed, emits a sickening odor of decay. ”

“ It varies in width from one to three miles, and is thought by many to be an estuary. From the mouth of the St. John’s to Pilatka there are numerous bluffs, some of them ten or twelve feet in height, with an under-stratum of shells, on which elevations the pine-tree flourishes. The cypress, ash, and cabbage-palmetto grow on the banks above Pilatka. The weeping cypress, with its leafless, conical excrescences, called knees, and dropsical feet, loves to be alone. ”

“ But, in the Isle of Crete, in whatever place the earth is moved, this tree will shoot up2582 of its own natural vigour, and immediately appear above the soil; indeed, in that island there is no occasion even to solicit the soil, for it grows spontaneously there, on the mountains of Ida more particularly, and those known as the White Mountains. On the very summit of these elevations, from which the snows never depart, we find the cypress growing in great abundance; a thing that is truly marvellous—seeing that, in other countries, it will only grow in warm localities ”