CHAP. cxrn.

CONI'FERJE. XA'RIX.

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bable. Pliny frequently mentions the larch; and, in his 16th book, hasgiven the description of it which we have already quoted (see p. 2112.). Inanother place, he tells us that larch timber is not corruptible like that of anyother pine; and that, when set on fire, it burns more like a stone than apiece of wood, never causing flame. (Lib. xvi. c. 40.) He also says the treenever flowers. These exaggerated assertions have occasioned doubts tobe expressed as to whether Pliny was really acquainted with the larch ; butwe find so many similar exaggerations and fabulous relations in his work re-specting other trees, that we see no sufficient reason to doubt it. WhenTiberius Caesar built his Naumachia, or aquatic amphitheatre, for exhibitinga naval action as a public spectacle, an enormous larch was brought to Rome,which measured 120 ft. in length, and 2 ft. in diameter at the smallest end.This tree, of which Pliny says, “ Amplissima arborum ad hoc tevi existimaturRomae visa,” Tiberius admired so much, that he would not permit it to he usedas timber, but had it preserved as a curiosity for public admiration. Nero, how-ever, had it cut up for an amphitheatre erected by him. The Forum of Augustuswas built with larch wood, as were several bridges in Rome. Vitruvius men-tions the larch, and attributes the decay of the buildings of Rome, erected inhis day, to the circumstance of this wood being no longer used in their con-struction, the forests of the larch in the neighbourhood of Rome having beenexhausted, and the builders not choosing to be at the expense of bringingthe timber from a distance. He also says that the wood is so ponderous,that it will sink in water; and he repeats the assertions of Pliny as to itsincorruptibility and incombustibility; adding that Julius Caesar, wishing toset fire to a wooden tower, placed before the gates of a castle in the Alps,called Larignum, which he was besieging, heaped up logs of larch woodaround it, which he attempted to ignite, but in vain. It is probably, in

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