2-888-118 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Funebral Cypress, 1850. 'The traveller who appears originally to have noticed the Funebral Cypress...was Sir George Staunton, when exploring China in the embassy of Lord Macartney...Subsequently, however, Mr. Fortune met with it near the celebrated tea country of Whey Chow; and through the interest of that gentleman, Messrs. Standish and Noble, of the Bagshot Nurseries...have been enabled to import both seeds and young plants. Mr. Fortune describes this Weeping Cypress as...a noble looking fir-tree, about sixty feet in height, having...pendulous branches like the weeping willow...It will be particularly valuable for park scenery, for lawns...suburban residences, and as an ornament for our cemeteries...The fact of its being perfectly hardy...has now been perfectly established - hundreds of young plants have stood the past winter uninjured in the Bagshot Nurseries...' From "Illustrated London News", 1850.