When a British forester talks of a spruce fir he may be understood to refer to Picea excelsa, commonly known as the Norway spruce, although in fact much of the Norwegian spruce forest is composed of the Siberian spruce (P. obovata), a species closely resembling the other, but incapable of thriving in the moist and relatively mild climate of Great Britain.

The so-called Norway spruce is not a native of the British Isles, its natural range extending from the Pyrenees on the south to Scandinavia on the north, and eastward through the Carpathian Mountains to Western Russia; but, next to the Scots pine and larch, it is the conifer most commonly seen in British woodland, and, where undergrowth is not too rank, it may reproduce itself from self-sown seed. It has, indeed, been far too extensively planted with us, probably owing to its cheapness and easiness to handle. It is only to be found well developed in inland districts, such as the valley of the Tay and Deeside, where it forms really fine forest, and where noble specimens may be seen.

At Blair Atholl there was a grand spruce blown down in 1893, measuring 142 feet in height and containing about 420 cubic feet of timber. There are still many lofty spruces in the woodland about Dunkeld and Dupplin, containing well-grown, clean timber, and Messrs. Elwes and Henry have recorded a number of trees in various parts of the United Kingdom from 130 to 150 feet high. As a rule, however, in this country spruce, even when the requisite shelter has been secured, is not grown under sufficiently strict forest conditions to produce the best deals; it is commonly raised in mixed plantations, wherein, being patient of side shade, it retains its branches, a habit that renders the timber coarse and full of knots.

Probably the most successful result from a plantation of pure spruce in Scotland was that obtained on the estate of Durris, on Deeside, where the trees on 400 acres were sold standing at 60 years old, the average number of spruce per acre being 560. As the average contents per tree were 10 cubic feet, and the price realised was 5d. per foot, the value amounted to £116 per acre.

It would be vain to expect any such return from spruce planted in such situations as are frequently given to it. In a seaboard exposure it is worse than useless, for no tree becomes more unsightly than a spruce under the influence of salt-laden winds. For such situations, if spruce be grown of any kind, there are other species likely to give better results. I shall name two of these presently, but, first, it may be mentioned that the genus Picea consists of two distinct groups—first, the true spruces, distinguished by having four-sided needles; second, the Omorika spruces, which have flat, two-sided needles. Inasmuch as some species of the second group have silvery undersides to the needles, they are apt to be mistaken for some kind of Abies, or silver fir. Here, again, the needle serves to distinguish between them, for, as aforesaid, in the spruce family the needles are set on little peg-like projections on the twig, whereas in the silver firs there is no such projection, but each needle when pulled off leaves a circular scar.

There are probably upwards of twenty species of true spruce, including the Norway spruce. Some of them well deserve attention from the arboriculturist, being exceedingly ornamental, such as the Himalayan Morinda (P. smithiana), first raised from seed at Hopetoun House, Linlithgowshire, in 1818, and now flourishing in various parts of the United Kingdom at a height of 70 to 80 feet, with handsome pendulous branchlets.

About Waterer's glaucous variety of the Colorado spruce (P. pungens), there is current an amusing account of its introduction to this country some five-and-twenty years ago. The late Mr. Anthony Waterer was an enthusiast in his calling as a nurseryman. A traveller came to him one day with a bag of seed which he said came off the bluest fir he had ever seen. "How much do you want for the bag?" asked Anthony. "Two hundred pounds," was the reply. "Oh! go along with you," exclaimed Anthony, "d'ye think I'm made of guineas?" The man departed, but left Anthony with his mouth watering (no pun intended) for the blue fir. He sent after the traveller, paid him his price, and sold thousands of the seedlings at half a guinea apiece. I cannot vouch for the truth of detail in this narrative, but the tenour thereof is quite in accord with Mr. Waterer's enterprise in his business.

Beautiful as some of these true spruces are, it is not among them that the forester need look for a substitute for the Norway spruce; but there are two at least in the other group which bid fair to oust it from its undeserved predominance in our woodlands. The first of these is the Sitka spruce, formerly known as the Menzies spruce, and still appearing in some trade catalogues as Abies menziesii, though now recognised by botanists only as Picea sitchensis. This grand tree, which in Oregon has been known to tower to the height of between 200 and 300 feet, has proved to be admirably suited for forestry purposes in the United Kingdom. It is a moisture lover, thriving in soil too wet and sour for any other conifer, and as it grows right down to the coast in Northern California and Alaska, it does not share the dislike of the Norway spruce for the breath of the ocean. This spruce, having been introduced to this country in 1831 by David Douglas, has been long enough with us to prove its quality, and there are many in the three kingdoms 100 feet high and upwards. Probably the largest in these islands is one at Castle Menzies, in Perthshire, which in 1904 measured 110 feet high and 13 feet 2 inches in girth at a height of 5 feet, having been planted in 1846. The timber is suitable for similar purposes to those served by Norway spruce; but the strong tendency of this tree to side-branching makes it essential that it should be grown close in pure forest in order to produce clean deals.

The other tree in the Omorika group which probably has a commercial future in this country is the Manchurian spruce, Picea ajanensis or jezoensis. I do not know that this tree is stocked by nurserymen in this country, but seed can be obtained from Continental merchants, and I am induced to speak favourably of it from the behaviour of about one hundred plants which I put out about twelve years ago. In the nursery it bears so close a resemblance to the Sitka spruce that it is difficult to distinguish between the two species until the plants are three or four years old; but after that age they differ markedly in foliage and habit of growth, the Manchurian spruce being less inclined to branch outwards than the Sitka and has no tendency to the characteristic of dropping its needles which is apt to disfigure the American species. In the forests of Yezo (the northern island of Japan) this spruce is reported as growing to a height of 150-200 feet. Its growth with me is extremely vigorous, and it seems to enjoy a maritime climate, which the Norway spruce does not. Like all the spruces, this tree is well adapted for the manufacture of wood pulp and celluloid.

I cannot part from the spruce family without going back to the square-needled group in order to commend the Caucasian spruce (Picea orientalis) as an ornamental tree. The slowness of its growth compared with that of the Sitka, Manchurian, and Norwegian spruces may be thought detrimental to its value to British planters for profit; but the grace of its outline, and the fine, rich green of its shining foliage render it one of the choicest of conifers. In the Caucasus it rises to a height of 180 feet, with a girth of 12 feet; and in the British Isles, whither it was first brought in 1839, there are many specimens between 60 and 80 feet high.

The name "spruce" has an interesting origin, about which some controversy has been waged. From the fourteenth to the sixteenth century Spruce occurs in English literature as an alternative form of Pruce—that is, Prussia. The Prussians were then distinguished among the nations as great dandies. The chronicler Hall, in describing the splendid attire of some of Henry VIII.'s courtiers, observes that "they were appareyled after the fashion of Prussia or Spruce." Hence "spruce" came to be a synonym for "smart, finely dressed"; and some etymologists have argued that the spruce fir means the Prussian fir; but this has been shown to be an error. The tree takes its name from the sprouts, called sprossen in German, whence is distilled the essence of spruce, used in brewing sprossen-bier or spruce beer. So the tree came to be termed in German sprossen-fichte, translated into English spruce-fir, though we do not brew spruce beer. Therefore the name does really come to us from Prussia, though not in the manner supposed by the older etymologists.

This digression into etymology brings to mind another word connected with the spruce fir, namely "deal," which owns to one of the most remarkable etymologies in our language. Although it has not been traced to its original root, it exists in all branches of Teutonic speech, always in the sense of a share or division. It also occurs in Gaelic as dal, signifying a portion of land, as Dalnaspidal—the land portion of the hospital; Dalrymple (dal chruim puil, the farm of the crooked pool—on the Doon), and so on. The Anglo-Saxon dÆl meant a portion, a share; whence we use the word in phrases such as "a deal of cards," "a great deal,"[18] and have applied it to express the planks into which a tree is "divided," or sawn up. From a Scandinavian source we get another form of the word "dale," meaning a valley, as Tweeddale, Annandale, etc.; for in Norway one dale or valley is "divided" from another by mountains.