The Gingko or Maidenhair-tree (Gingko biloba) is among the most interesting of trees, owing to its being, like the Araucaria, a survival of the vegetation prevailing when the aspect of our globe was very different from that which it bears now. Both Gingko and Araucaria were classed as conifers by the older botanists; but certain archaic features in each have been recognised as justifying their rearrangement in two separate natural orders.

The gingko has not been found anywhere in a wild state, and owes its preservation from an extremely remote past to the care which the Chinese have always shown to preserve part of the natural forest round their temples. It is in such situations that it is now found in China, Corea, and Japan; but Dr. Henry suggests that it may not improbably exist in the unexplored forests of central China.

The true affinity of this strange tree is with the ferns and cycads, dominant orders in the Mesozoic world. It is, however, a true phanerogam or flowering plant, the male and female flowers being born on separate trees. The fruit and leaves found in the Lias clay at Ardtun, in the Isle of Mull, have been pronounced indistinguishable from those of the existing species.[29] What a vast chasm of time divides us from the summers when these fruit and leaves were produced! Since they fell our land has been ploughed and scarred by the land ice of successive glacial periods, each enduring for unnumbered thousands of years; yet these fragile relics, drifting into clefts and crannies and overlaid by the clay which the ice ground out of the rocks, have survived the rocks themselves. And now the climate of these islands has been tempered again, so that the gingko finds a congenial home in our pleasure grounds.

It is a very beautiful tree, provided it is raised from seed, or, at least, propagated by layers. Unluckily, planters are very apt to be supplied with young trees reared from cuttings, which never turn out well, for seed is seldom produced in this country, owing to the different sexes not being planted together, and the rapidity with which imported seeds lose their vitality. The foliage is unlike that of any other tree grown in Great Britain, the leathery, light green, fan-shaped leaves suggesting the design of a gigantic maidenhair fern, whence it used to be known botanically as Salisburia adiantifolia. The foliage turns a beautiful clear yellow in autumn.

The first European botanist to mention the gingko was KÆmpfer, who found it in Japan in 1690, but it was not introduced to England until more than sixty years later. In Scotland it does not seem to have been often planted, though it is quite hardy in the milder districts. The only considerable specimen I have seen north of the Tweed was one 40 or 50 feet high on the banks of the Ayr at Auchincruive. This was blown down some years ago, but when I saw it last it was growing vigorously from the stool.

There are many fine gingkos in England. The finest known to me are at The Grove, near Watford, 68 feet high, with a girth of 8 feet 5 inches in 1904 (see plate at page 228). One at Panshanger, in the same county, of which I did not measure the height, was reported to be 70 feet, and I found the girth to be 8 feet. Both of these are most graceful, vigorous trees, but they must yield in stature to one at Melbury House, near Dorchester, which has reached a height of more than 80 feet. No tree-lover who has seen such fine examples as these can fail to regret that more frequent use has not been made of the gingko in ornamental planting. That is its proper function with us, for the timber is of no more than mediocre quality.

Many fine gingkos may be seen in the Loire valley, at Geneva, and in northern Italy; but nowhere have I been so much impressed with their decorative qualities as in the beautiful city of Washington, where they have been planted in a long avenue along one of the principal streets. True, they have not yet attained a great stature—from 30 to 40 feet are the tallest—but their verdure is most refreshing in that sun-baked capital, and it is easy to imagine what they may become at their present free rate of growth.

The gingko is particularly well suited for a town atmosphere. In the most malodorous part of evil-smelling Brentford, close to a brewery and opposite a huge gaswork, stands the wreck of a fine one. Jammed in between grimy buildings, it has lost its top, but each spring it still hangs out its fairy leafage over the dingy thoroughfare.