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Var. shastensis, Lemmon, West. Amer. Cone-bearers, 62 (1895); Sargent, Szlva N. Amer. xii. 138, t. 620 (1898), and Trees N. Amer. 67 (1905).

Var. xanthocarpa, Lemmon, Third Report, ex Masters, Journ. Roy. Hort. Soc. xiv. 193 (1892), and Gard, Chron. xli. 114, figs. 51, 52, 53 (1907).

Abies shastensis, Lemmon, Garden and Forest, x. 184 (1897); Coville, Garden and Forest, x. 516 (1897).

Abies nobilis robusta, Masters, Gard. Chron, xxiv. 652, f. 147 (1885) (not Carriére).

Abies nobilis, Lindley, var. magnifica, Masters, Journ. Linn. Soc. (Bot.) xxii. 193, Pl. 5 (1886).

This differs from the type only in the cones, which have much longer bracts, yellow in colour, rounded or obtusely pointed (not acute), exserted, usually reflexed, and covering about half the outer surface of the scales.

This variety, which is known as the Shasta Fir, occurs on the mountains of southern Oregon, in the cross and coast ranges of northern California and on the southern Sierra Nevada. In Oregon it is met with in the lower parts of the mountains ; but in the other localities it only occurs at very high elevations.

It is rare in cultivation in England, or at any rate has been rarely noticed. A tree at the Cranston Nursery, near Hereford, produced cones! of this kind in 1878, which were figured? by Dr. Masters. Another is growing at Durris Castle, Aberdeenshire, where Mr. Crozier states that intermediate forms between this and A. nobilis exist.

This species is only liable to be confused with A. nobilis; but in large trees, as seen in cultivation, the difference in habit between the two species is remarkable. The formal arrangement of the branches in A. magnifica, though difficult to describe, when once seen can seldom be mistaken. The differences in the foliage are given in the Key, p. 718. (A.H.)

The most northerly point at which this tree has been found is on the mountains east of Odell Lake in about lat. 44° N. in southern Oregon, where Dr. Coville collected it in 1897, many miles south of where A. nobilis occurs ; and it is not men- tioned among the trees of the Cascade Forest Reserve, so that it really belongs to the Californian rather than to the North Pacific flora. It becomes common on the Trinity Mountains, and on Mt. Shasta is the only fir besides A. Lowiana. The tree extends along the entire length of the western slope of the Sierra Nevada, from 6000 to 9000 feet above the sea, and extends to the eastern slope at high elevations.

The northern form has been separated by Lemmon under the name of A. shastensis, on account of the bracts which protrude from the scales; being in this respect, as in its geographical distribution, midway between A. nobilis and A. magnifica;

1 Gard. Chron. 1878, p. 343.

2 Journ. Linn, Soc. (Bot). xxii, 193, plate v. (1886).