Section 2. Flowers Unisexual (_usually Perfect in Ulmus_); Calyx

regular; stamens as many as its lobes and opposite them; ovary superior, 1-celled (rarely 2-celled in Ulmus); seed 1.

XI. ULMACEÆ.

Trees, with watery juice, scaly buds, terete branchlets prolonged by an upper lateral bud, and alternate simple serrate pinnately veined deciduous stalked 2-ranked leaves unequal and often oblique at base, conduplicate in the bud, their stipules usually fugaceous. Flowers perfect or monœciously polygamous, clustered, or the pistillate sometimes solitary; calyx 4—9-parted or lobed; stamens 4—6; filaments straight; anthers introrse, 2-celled, opening longitudinally; ovary usually 1-celled; ovule solitary, suspended from the apex of the cell, anatropous or amphitropous; styles 2. Fruit a samara, nut, or drupe; albumen little or none; embryo straight or curved; cotyledons usually flat or conduplicate. Five of the thirteen genera of the Elm family occur in North America. Of these four are represented by trees.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN ARBORESCENT GENERA.

Fruit a dry samara, or nut-like. Flowers perfect; fruit a samara. 1. Ulmus. Flowers polygamo-monœcious; fruit nut-like, tuberculate. 2. Planera. Fruit drupaceous. Pistillate flowers usually solitary. 3. Celtis. Pistillate flowers in dichotomous cymes. 4. Trema.

1. ULMUS L. Elm.

Trees, or rarely shrubs, with deeply furrowed bark, branchlets often furnished with corky wings, and buds with numerous ovate rounded chestnut-brown scales closely imbricated in two ranks, increasing in size from without inward, the inner accrescent, replacing the stipules of the first leaves, deciduous, marking the base of the branchlet with persistent ring-like scars. Leaves simply or doubly serrate; stipules linear, lanceolate to obovate, entire, free or connate at base, scarious, inclosing the leaf in the bud, caducous. Flowers from axillary buds near the ends of the branches similar to but larger than the leaf-buds, the outer scales sterile, the inner bearing flowers and rarely leaves. Flowers perfect, jointed on slender bibracteolate pedicels from the axils of linear acute scarious bracts, in pedunculate or subsessile fascicles or cymes sometimes becoming racemose, appearing in early spring before the leaves in the axils of those of the previous year, or autumnal in the axils of leaves of the year; calyx campanulate, 5—9-lobed, membranaceous, marcescent; stamens 5 or 6 inserted under the ovary; filaments filiform or slightly flattened, erect in the bud, becoming exserted; anthers oblong, emarginate, and subcordate; ovary sessile or stipitate, compressed, crowned by a simple deeply 2-lobed style, the spreading lobes papillo-stigmatic on the inner face, usually 1-celled by abortion, rarely 2-celled; ovule amphitropous; micropyle extrorse, superior. Fruit an ovoid or oblong, often oblique, sessile or stipitate samara surrounded at base by the remnants of the calyx, the seminal cavity compressed, slightly thickened on the margin, chartaceous, produced into a thin reticulate-venulose membranaceous light brown broad or rarely narrow wing naked or ciliate on the margin, tipped with the remnants of the persistent style, or more or less deeply notched at apex, and often marked by the thickened line of the union of the two carpels. Seed ovoid, compressed, without albumen, marked on the ventral edge by the thin raphe; testa membranaceous, light or dark chestnut-brown, of two coats, rarely produced into a narrow wing; embryo erect; cotyledons flat or slightly convex, much longer than the superior radicle turned toward the oblong linear pale hilum.

Ulmus, with eighteen or twenty species, is widely distributed through the boreal and temperate regions of the northern hemisphere with the exception of western North America, reaching in the New World the mountains of southern Mexico and in the Old World the Sikkim Himalaya, western China, and Japan. Of the exotic species, Ulmus procera Salisb., the so-called English Elm, and Ulmus glabra, Huds., the Scotch Elm, and several of its varieties, have been largely planted for shade and ornament in the north Atlantic states, where old and large specimens of the former can be seen, especially in the neighborhood of Boston.

Ulmus produces heavy, hard, tough, light-colored wood, often difficult to split. The tough inner bark of some of the species is made into ropes or woven into coarse cloth, and in northern China nourishing mucilaginous food is prepared from the inner bark.

Ulmus is the classical name of the Elm-tree.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES.

Flowers vernal, appearing before the leaves. Flowers on slender drooping pedicels; fruit ciliate on the margins. Wing of the fruit broad. Bud-scales and fruit glabrous; branchlets destitute of corky wings; leaves obovate-oblong to elliptic, usually smooth on the upper, soft-pubescent on the lower surface. 1. U. americana (A, C). Bud-scales puberulous; branches often furnished with corky wings; fruit hirsute; leaves obovate to oblong, smooth on the upper, soft-pubescent on the lower surface. 2. U. racemosa (A). Wing of the fruit narrow; bud-scales glabrous or slightly puberulous; branchlets usually furnished with broad corky wings; fruit hirsute, leaves ovate-oblong to oblong-lanceolate, smooth on the upper, soft-pubescent on the lower surface. 3. U. alata (A, C). Flowers on short pedicels; fruit naked on the margins; bud-scales coated with rusty hairs; fruit pubescent; leaves ovate-oblong, scabrous on the upper, pubescent on the lower surface. 4. U. fulva (A, C). Flowers autumnal, appearing in the axils of leaves of the year; branchlets furnished with corky wings; fruit hirsute. Bud-scales puberulous; flowers on short pedicels; leaves ovate, scabrous on the upper, soft-pubescent on the lower surface. 5. U. crassifolia (C). Bud-scales glabrous; flowers on long pedicels; leaves oblong to oblong-obovate, acuminate, glabrous on the upper, pale and puberulous on the lower surface. 6. U. serotina (C).

1. Ulmus americana L. White Elm.

Leaves obovate-oblong to elliptic, abruptly narrowed at apex into a long point, full and rounded at base on one side and shorter and cuneate on the other, coarsely doubly serrate with slightly incurved teeth, when they unfold coated below with pale pubescence and pilose above with long scattered white hairs, at maturity 4′—6′ long, 1′—3′ wide, dark green and glabrous or scabrate above, pale and soft-pubescent or sometimes glabrous below, with a narrow pale midrib and numerous slender straight primary veins running to the points of the teeth and connected by fine cross veinlets; turning bright clear yellow in the autumn before falling; petioles stout, ¼′ in length; stipules linear-lanceolate, ½′—2′ long. Flowers on long slender drooping pedicels sometimes 1′ in length, in 3 or 4-flowered short-stalked fascicles; calyx irregularly divided into 7—9 rounded lobes ciliate on the margins, often somewhat oblique, puberulous on the outer surface, green tinged with red above the middle; anthers bright red; ovary light green, ciliate on the margins with long white hairs; styles light green. Fruit on long pedicels in crowded clusters, ripening as the leaves unfold, ovoid to obovoid-oblong, slightly stipitate, conspicuously reticulate-venulose, ½′ long, ciliate on the margins, the sharp points of the wings incurved and inclosing the deep notch.

A tree, sometimes 100°—120° high, with a tall trunk 6°—11° in diameter, frequently enlarged at the base by great buttresses, occasionally rising with a straight undivided shaft to the height of 60°—80° and separating into short spreading branches, more commonly divided 30°—40° from the ground into numerous upright limbs gradually spreading and forming an inversely conic round-topped head of long graceful branches, often 100° or rarely 150° in diameter, and slender branchlets frequently fringing the trunk and its principal divisions, light green and coated at first with soft pale pubescence, becoming in their first winter light reddish brown, glabrous or sometimes puberulous and marked by scattered pale lenticels, and by large elevated semiorbicular leaf-scars showing the ends of three large equidistant fibro-vascular bundles, later becoming dark reddish brown and finally ashy gray. Winter-buds ovoid, acute, slightly flattened, about ⅛′ long, with broadly ovate rounded light chestnut-brown glabrous scales, the inner bright green, ovate, acute, becoming on vigorous shoots often nearly 1′ in length. Bark 1′—1½′ thick, ashy gray, divided by deep fissures into broad ridges separating on the surface into thin appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, tough, difficult to split, coarse-grained, light brown, with thick somewhat lighter colored sapwood; largely used for the hubs of wheels, saddle-trees, in flooring and cooperage, and in boat and shipbuilding.

Distribution. River-bottom lands, intervales, low rich hills, and the banks of streams; southern Newfoundland to the northern shores of Lake Superior and the headwaters of the Saskatchewan, southward to the neighborhood of Lake Istokpoga, De Soto County, Florida, westward in the United States to the Turtle Mountains of North Dakota, the Black Hills of South Dakota, western Nebraska, central Kansas and Oklahoma, and the valley of the upper Colorado River (Fort Chadbourne, Coke County), Texas; very common northward, less abundant and of smaller size southward; abundant on the banks of streams flowing through the midcontinental plateau.

Largely planted as an ornamental and shade tree in the northern states, and rarely in western and northern Europe.

2. Ulmus racemosa Thomas. Rock Elm. Cork Elm.

Ulmus Thomasii Sarg.

Leaves obovate to oblong-oval, rather abruptly narrowed at apex into a short broad point, equally or somewhat unequally rounded, cuneate or subcordate at base, and coarsely doubly serrate, when they unfold pilose on the upper surface and covered on the lower with soft white hairs, at maturity 2′—2½′ long, ¾′—1′ wide, thick and firm, smooth, dark green and lustrous above, paler and soft-pubescent below, especially on the stout midrib and the numerous straight veins running to the point of the teeth and connected by obscure cross veinlets; turning in the autumn bright clear yellow; petioles pubescent, about ¼′ in length; stipules ovate-lanceolate, conspicuously veined, light green, marked with dark red on the margins above the middle, ⅔′ long, clasping the stem by their abruptly enlarged cordate base conspicuously dentate with 1—3 prominent teeth on each side, falling when the leaves are half grown. Flowers on elongated slender drooping pedicels often ½′ long, in 2—4, usually in 3-flowered, puberulous cymes becoming more or less racemose by the lengthening of the axis of the inflorescence, and when fully grown sometimes 2′ in length; calyx green, divided nearly to the middle into 7 or 8 rounded dark red scarious lobes; anthers dark purple; ovary coated with long pale hairs most abundant on the margins; styles light green. Fruit ripening when the leaves are about half grown, ovoid or obovoid-oblong, ½′ long, with a shallow open notch at the apex, obscurely veined, pale pubescent, ciliate on the slightly thickened border of the broad wing, the margin of the seminal cavity scarcely thickened.

A tree, 80°—100° high, with a trunk occasionally 3° in diameter, and often free of branches for 60°, short stout spreading branches forming a narrow round-topped head, and slender rigid branchlets, light brown when they first appear, and coated with soft pale pubescence often persistent until their second season, becoming light reddish brown, puberulous or glabrous and lustrous in their first winter, and marked by scattered oblong lenticels and large orbicular or semiorbicular leaf-scars displaying an irregular row of 4—6 fibro-vascular bundle-scars, ultimately dark brown or ashy gray, and usually furnished with 3 or 4 thick corky irregular wings often ½′ broad, and beginning to appear in their first or more often during their second year. Winter-buds ovoid, acute, ¼′ long, with broadly ovate rounded chestnut-brown scales pilose on the outer surface, ciliate on the margins, the inner scales becoming ovate-oblong to lanceolate, and ½′ long, often dentate at the base, with 1 or 2 minute teeth on each side, bright green below the middle, marked with a red blotch above, and white and scarious at the apex. Bark ¾′—1′ thick, gray tinged with red, and deeply divided by wide irregular interrupted fissures into broad flat ridges broken on the surface into large irregularly shaped scales. Wood heavy, hard, very strong and tough, close-grained, light clear brown often tinged with red, with thick lighter colored sapwood; largely employed in the manufacture of many agricultural implements, for the framework of chairs, hubs of wheels, railway-ties, the sills of buildings, and other purposes demanding toughness, solidity and flexibility.

Distribution. Dry gravelly uplands, low heavy clay soils, rocky slopes and river cliffs; Province of Quebec westward through Ontario, the southern peninsula of Michigan and central Wisconsin to northeastern Nebraska, western Missouri and eastern Kansas, and southward to northern New Hampshire, southern Vermont, western New York, (valley of the Genesee River), northern New Jersey, southern Ohio (near Columbus, Franklin County), and central Indiana; rare in the east and toward the extreme western and southern limits of its range.

Occasionally planted as a shade and ornamental tree in the northern states.

3. Ulmus alata Michx. Wahoo. Winged Elm.

Leaves ovate-oblong to oblong-lanceolate, often somewhat falcate, acute or acuminate, unequally cuneate or rounded or subcordate at base, and coarsely doubly serrate with incurved teeth, when they unfold pale green often tinged with red, coated on the lower surface with soft white pubescence and glabrous or nearly so on the upper surface, at maturity thick and firm or subcoriaceous, dark green and smooth above, pale and soft-pubescent below, especially on the stout yellow midrib and numerous straight prominent veins often forked near the margins of the leaf and connected by rather conspicuous reticulate veinlets; turning yellow in the autumn; their petioles stout, pubescent, ⅓′ in length; stipules linear-obovate, thin and scarious, tinged with red above the middle, often nearly 1′ long. Flowers on drooping pedicels, in short few-flowered fascicles; calyx glabrous and divided nearly to the middle into 5 broad ovate rounded lobes as long as the hoary-tomentose ovary raised on a short slender stipe. Fruit ripening before or with the unfolding of the leaves, oblong, ⅓′ in length, contracted at base into a long slender stalk, gradually narrowed and tipped at apex with long incurved awns, and covered with long white hairs most numerous on the thickened margin of the narrow wing; seed ovoid, pointed, ⅛′ long, pale, chestnut-brown, slightly thickened into a narrow wing-like margin.

A tree, occasionally 80°—100° but usually not more than 40°—50° high, with a trunk 2°—3° in diameter, short stout straight or erect branches forming a narrow oblong rather open round-topped head, and slender branchlets glabrous or puberulous and light green tinged with red when they first appear, becoming light reddish brown or ashy gray and glabrous, or on vigorous individuals frequently pilose in their first winter, marked by occasional small orange-colored lenticels and by small elevated horizontal semiorbicular leaf-scars, sometimes naked, more often furnished with usually 2 thin corky wings beginning to grow during their first or more often during their second season, abruptly arrested at the nodes, often ½′ wide, and persistent for many years. Winter-buds slender, acute, ⅛′ long, dark chestnut-brown, with glabrous or puberulous scales, those of the inner ranks becoming oblong or obovate, rounded and tipped with a minute mucro, thin and scarious, light red, especially above the middle, and ½′ long. Bark rarely exceeding ¼′ in thickness, light brown tinged with red, and divided by irregular shallow fissures into flat ridges covered by small closely appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, not strong, close-grained, difficult to split, light brown, with thick lighter colored sapwood; sometimes employed for the hubs of wheels and the handles of tools. Ropes used for fastening the covers of cotton bales are sometimes made from the inner bark.

Distribution. Usually on dry gravelly uplands, less commonly in alluvial soil on the borders of swamps and the banks of streams, and occasionally in inundated swamps; southeastern Virginia, southwestern Indiana, southern Illinois (Richland and Johnson Counties) and southern Missouri, and southward to central Florida (Lake County), and the valley of the Guadalupe River, Texas; ranging westward in Oklahoma to Garfield County (near Kingfisher, G. W. Stevens).

Often planted as a shade-tree in the streets of towns and villages of the southern states.

4. Ulmus fulva Michx. Slippery Elm. Red Elm.

Leaves ovate-oblong, abruptly contracted into a long slender point, rounded at base on one side and short-oblique on the other, and coarsely doubly serrate with incurved callous-tipped teeth, when they unfold thin, coated below with pale pubescence, pilose above with scattered white hairs, at maturity thick and firm, dark green and rugose with crowded sharp-pointed tubercles pointing toward the apex of the leaf above, soft, smooth, and coated below, especially on the thin midrib and in the axils of the slender straight veins with white hairs, 5′—7′ long, 2′—3′ wide; turning a dull yellow color in the autumn; petioles stout, pubescent, ⅓′ in length; stipules obovate-oblong to oblong-lanceolate, thin and scarious, pale-pubescent, and tipped with clusters of rusty brown hairs. Flowers on short pedicels, in crowded fascicles; calyx green, covered with pale hairs, divided into 5—9 short rounded thin equal lobes; stamens with slender light yellow slightly flattened filaments and dark red anthers; stigmas slightly exserted, reddish purple, papillose with soft white hairs. Fruit ripening when the leaves are about half grown, semiorbicular, rounded and bearing the remnants of the styles or slightly emarginate at apex, rounded or cuneate at base, ½′ broad, the seminal cavity coated with thick rusty brown tomentum, the broad thin wing obscurely reticulate-veined, naked on the thickened margin, and marked by the dark conspicuous horizontal line of union of the two carpels; seed ovoid, with a large oblique pale hilum, a light chestnut-brown coat produced into a thin border wider below than above the middle of the seed.

A tree, 60°—70° high, with a trunk occasionally 2° in diameter, spreading branches forming a broad open flat-topped head, and stout branchlets bright green, scabrate, and coated with soft pale pubescence when they first appear, becoming light brown by midsummer, often roughened by small pale lenticels, and in their first winter ashy gray, orange color or light red-brown, and marked by large elevated semiorbicular leaf-scars showing the ends of 3 conspicuous equidistant fibro-vascular bundles, ultimately dark gray or brown. Winter-buds ovoid, obtuse, ¼′ long, with about 12 scales, the outer broadly ovate, rounded, dark chestnut-brown, and covered by long scattered rusty hairs, the inner when fully grown ½′ long, ⅛′—¼′ wide, light green, strap-shaped, rounded and tipped at the apex with tufts of rusty hairs, puberulous on the outer surface, slightly ciliate on the margins, gradually growing narrower and passing into the stipules of the upper leaves. Bark frequently 1′ thick, dark brown tinged with red, divided by shallow fissures and covered by large thick appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, very close-grained, durable, easy to split, dark brown or red, with thin lighter colored sapwood; largely used for fence-posts, railway-ties, the sills of buildings, the hubs of wheels, and in agricultural implements. The thick fragrant inner bark is mucilaginous and demulcent, and is employed in the treatment of acute febrile and inflammatory affections.

Distribution. Banks of streams and low rocky hillsides in deep rich soil; comparatively common in the valley of the St. Lawrence River, Province of Quebec, and through Ontario to northern and eastern South Dakota, northeastern and eastern Nebraska, southeastern Kansas, and Oklahoma to the valley of the Canadian River (McClain County), and southward to western Florida, central Alabama and Mississippi, western Louisiana and the valley of the upper Guadalupe (Kerr County) and Leon Rivers (Comal County), Texas; in the South Atlantic states not common and mostly confined to the middle districts, ascending to altitudes of 2000° on the southern Appalachian foothills.

5. Ulmus crassifolia Nutt. Cedar Elm.

Leaves elliptic to ovate, acute or rounded at apex, unequally rounded or cuneate and often oblique at base, coarsely and unequally doubly serrate with callous-tipped teeth, when they unfold thin, light green tinged with red, pilose above and covered below with soft pale pubescence, at maturity thick and subcoriaceous, dark green, lustrous and roughened by crowded minute sharp-pointed tubercles on the upper surface and soft pubescent on the lower surface, 1′—2′ long, ½′—1′ wide, with a stout yellow midrib, and prominent straight veins connected by conspicuous more or less reticulate cross veinlets; usually turning bright yellow late in the autumn; petioles stout, tomentose, ¼′—½′ in length; stipules ½′ long, linear-lanceolate, red and scarious above, clasping the stem by their green and hairy bases, deciduous when the leaves are about half grown. Flowers usually opening in August and sometimes also in October, on slender pedicels ⅓′—½′ long and covered with white hairs, in 3—5-flowered pedunculate fascicles; calyx divided to below the middle into oblong pointed lobes hairy at base; ovary hirsute, crowned with two short slightly exserted stigmas. Fruit ripening in September and rarely also in November, oblong, gradually and often irregularly narrowed from the middle to the ends, short-stalked, deeply notched at apex, ⅓′ to nearly ½′ long, covered with soft white hairs, most abundant on the slightly thickened margin of the broad wing; seed oblique, pointed, and covered by a dark chestnut-brown coat.

A tree, often 80° high, with a tall straight trunk 2°—3° in diameter, sometimes free of branches for 30° or 40°, divided into numerous stout spreading limbs forming a broad inversely conic round-topped head of long pendulous branches, or while young or on dry uplands a compact round head of drooping branches, and slender branchlets, tinged with red and coated with soft pale pubescence when they first appear, becoming light reddish brown, puberulous and marked by scattered minute lenticels and by small elevated semiorbicular leaf-scars showing the ends of 3 small fibro-vascular bundles, and furnished with 2 corky wings covered with lustrous brown bark, about ¼′ broad and continuous except when abruptly interrupted by lateral branchlets, or often irregularly developed. Winter-buds broadly ovoid, acute, ⅛′ long, with closely imbricated chestnut-brown scales slightly puberulous on the outer surface, those of the inner ranks at maturity oblong, concave, rounded at apex, thin, bright red, sometimes ¾′ long. Bark sometimes nearly 1′ thick, light brown slightly tinged with red, and deeply divided by interrupted fissures into broad flat ridges broken on the surface into thick scales. Wood heavy, hard, strong, brittle, light brown tinged with red, with thick lighter colored sapwood; in central Texas used in the manufacture of the hubs of wheels, for furniture, and largely for fencing.

Distribution. Valley of the Sunflower River, Mississippi (Morehead, Sunflower County), through southern Arkansas, and Texas to Nuevo Leon, ranging in western Texas from the coast to the valley of the Pecos River; in Arkansas usually on river cliffs and low hillsides, and in Texas near streams in deep alluvial soil and on dry limestone hills; the common Elm-tree of Texas and of its largest size on the bottom-lands of the Guadalupe and Trinity Rivers.

Occasionally planted as a shade-tree in the streets of the cities and towns of Texas.

6. Ulmus serotina Sarg. Red Elm.

Leaves oblong to oblong-obovate, acuminate, very oblique at base, coarsely and doubly crenulate-serrate, when they unfold coated below with shining white hairs and puberulous above, at maturity thin and firm in texture, yellow-green, glabrous and lustrous on the upper surface, pale and puberulous on the midrib and principal veins below, 2′—4′ long, 1′—1¾′ wide, with a prominent yellow midrib, about 20 pairs of primary veins extending obliquely to the points of the teeth and often forked near the margins of the leaf, and numerous reticular veinlets; turning clear orange-yellow in the autumn; petioles stout, about ¼′ in length; stipules abruptly narrowed from broad clasping bases, linear-lanceolate, usually about ¼′ long, persistent until the leaves are nearly fully grown. Flowers opening in September on slender conspicuously jointed pedicels often ⅛′ long, in many-flowered glabrous racemes from 1′—1½′ in length; calyx 6-parted to the base, with oblong-obovate red-brown divisions rounded at apex; ovary sessile, narrowed below, villose. Fruit ripening early in November, stipitate, oblong-elliptic, deeply divided at apex, fringed on the margins with long silvery white hairs, about ½′ long.

A tree, 50°—60° high, with a trunk 2°—3° in diameter, comparatively small spreading or pendulous branches often forming a broad handsome head, and slender pendulous branchlets glabrous or occasionally puberulous when they first appear, brown, lustrous, and marked by occasional oblong white lenticels during their first year, becoming darker the following season and ultimately dark gray-brown, and often furnished with 2 or 3 thick corky wings developed during their second or third years. Winter-buds ovoid, acute, ¼′ long, their outer scales oblong-obovate, dark chestnut-brown, glabrous, the inner often scarious on the margins, pale yellow-green, lustrous and sometimes ¾′ long when fully grown. Bark ¼′—⅜′ thick, light brown slightly tinged with red, and divided by shallow fissures into broad flat ridges broken on the surface into large thin closely appressed scales. Wood hard, close-grained, very strong and tough, light red-brown, with pale yellow sapwood.

Distribution. Limestone hills and river banks; rare and local; eastern (near Pikeville, Pike County) and southern Kentucky (Bowling Green, Warren County); banks of the Cumberland River, near Clarksville and Nashville, Tennessee; northeastern Georgia (cliffs of the Coosa River, near Rome, Floyd County); northern Alabama (Madison, Jefferson and Tuscaloosa Counties); valley of the Arkansas River (near Van Buren, Crawford County, G. M. Brown) and northwestern Arkansas (Sulphur Springs, Benton County, and Boston Mountains near Jasper, Newton County, E. J. Palmer); eastern Oklahoma (near Muskogee, Muskogee County, B. H. Slavin); southwestern (Grand Tower, Jackson County, H. A. Gleason) and southern Illinois (Richland County, R. Ridgway).

Occasionally planted as a shade-tree in the streets of cities in northern Georgia and northern Alabama; hardy in Eastern Massachusetts.

2. PLANERA Gmel.

A tree, with scaly puberulous branchlets roughened by scattered pale lenticels, and at the end of their first season by small nearly orbicular leaf-scars marked by a row of fibro-vascular bundle-scars, minute subglobose winter-buds covered by numerous thin closely imbricated chestnut-brown scales, the outer more or less scarious on the margins, the inner accrescent, becoming at maturity ovate-oblong, scarious, bright red, ⅓′—½′ long, marking in falling the base of the branchlet with pale ring-like scars. Leaves alternate, 2-ranked, ovate-oblong, acute or rounded at the narrowed apex, unequally cuneate or rounded at base, coarsely crenately serrate with unequal gland-tipped teeth, with numerous straight conspicuous veins forked near the margin and connected by cross reticulate veinlets more conspicuous below than above, when they unfold puberulous on the lower and pilose on the upper surface, at maturity thick or subcoriaceous and scabrate; petiolate with slender terete puberulous petioles; stipules lateral, free, ovate, scarious, bright red. Flowers polygamo-monœcious, the staminate fascicled in the axils of the outer scales of leaf-bearing buds, short-pedicellate, the pistillate or perfect on elongated puberulous pedicels in the axils of the leaves of the year in 1—3-flowered fascicles; pedicels without bracts; calyx campanulate, divided nearly to the base into 4 or 5 lobes rounded at apex, greenish yellow often tinged with red; stamens inserted under the ovary in the pistillate flower, sometimes few or 0; filaments filiform, erect, exserted; anthers broadly ovate, emarginate, cordate; ovary ovoid, stipitate, glandular-tuberculate, narrowed into a short style divided into 2 elongated reflexed stigmas papillo-stigmatic on the inner face, 0 in the staminate flower; ovule anatropous; micropyle extrorse, superior. Fruit an oblong oblique drupe, narrowed below into a short stipe, inclosed at the base by the withered calyx, crowned by the remnants of the style, its pericarp crustaceous, prominently ribbed on the anterior and posterior faces, irregularly tuberculate with elongated projections, and light chestnut-brown; seed ovoid, oblique, pointed at apex, rounded below, without albumen; testa thin, lustrous, dark brown or nearly black, of two coats; raphe inconspicuous; embryo erect; cotyledons thick, unequal, bright orange color, the apex of the larger hooded and slightly infolding the smaller, much longer than the minute radicle turned toward the linear pale hilum.

The genus is represented by a single species.

The generic name is in memory of Johann Jacob Planer, a German botanist and physician of the eighteenth century.

1. Planera aquatica Gmel. Water Elm.

Leaves 2′—2½′ long, ¾′—1′ wide, on petioles varying from ⅛′—¼′ in length, dark dull green on the upper surface, paler on the lower surface, with a yellow midrib and veins. Flowers appearing with the leaves. Fruit ripening in April, ⅓′ long.

A tree, 30°—40° high, with a short trunk rarely exceeding 20′ in diameter, rather slender spreading branches forming a low broad head, and branchlets brown tinged with red when they first appear, dark red in their first winter, and ultimately reddish brown or ashy gray. Bark about ¼′ thick, light brown or gray, separating into large scales disclosing in falling the red-brown inner bark. Wood light, soft, not strong, close-grained, light brown, with thick nearly white sapwood of 20—30 layers of annual growth.

Distribution. Swamps covered with water during several months of the year, or low river banks; valley of the Cape Fear River, North Carolina, southward to northern Florida (Bradford County) and westward usually not far from the coast through the Gulf states to the valleys of the Navasota (Brazos County) and of the Colorado (Matagorda County) Rivers, Texas, and northward through western Louisiana, eastern Oklahoma, and Arkansas to southeastern Missouri, northeastern Mississippi (near Iuka, Tishomingo County, T. G. Harbison), northern Kentucky (Henderson County), and the valley of the lower Wabash River, Illinois; comparatively rare and confined to the coast plain in the Atlantic states; abundant and of its largest size in western Louisiana and southern Arkansas.

3. CELTIS L.

Trees or shrubs, with thin, smooth often more or less muricate bark, unarmed or spinose branchlets, and scaly buds. Leaves serrate or entire, 3-nerved in one species, membranaceous or subcoriaceous, deciduous; stipules lateral, free, usually scarious, inclosing their leaf in the bud, caducous. Flowers polygamo-monœcious or rarely monœcious, appearing soon after the unfolding of the leaves, minute, pedicellate, on branches of the year, the staminate cymose or fascicled at their base, the pistillate solitary or in few-flowered fascicles from the axils of upper leaves; calyx divided nearly to the base into 4 or 5 lobes, greenish yellow, deciduous; stamens inserted on the margin of the discoid torus; filaments subulate, incurved in the bud, those of the sterile flower straightening themselves abruptly and becoming erect and exserted, shorter and remaining incurved in the perfect flower; anthers ovoid, attached on the back just above the emarginate base; ovary ovoid, sessile, green and lustrous, crowned with a short sessile style divided into diverging elongated reflexed acuminate entire lobes papillo-stigmatic on the inner face and mature before the anthers of the sterile flower, deciduous; minute and rudimentary in the staminate flower; ovule anatropous. Fruit an ovoid or globose drupe tipped with the remnants of the style, with thin flesh covered by a thick firm skin, and a thick-walled bony nutlet, reticulate-pitted in the American species. Seed filling the seminal cavity; albumen scanty, gelatinous, nearly inclosed between the folds of the cotyledons, or 0; testa membranaceous, of 2 confluent coats; chalaza colored, close to the minute hilum; embryo curved; cotyledons broad, foliaceous, conduplicate or rarely flat, variously folded, corrugate, incumbent, or inclosing the short superior ascending radicle.

Celtis is widely distributed through the temperate and tropical regions of the world, fifty or sixty species being distinguished.

Trees of the American species are often disfigured by gall-making insects which distort the buds and cause the production of dark broom-like clusters of short slender branchlets at the end of the branches.

Celtis was the classical name of a species of Lotus.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES.

Fruit on pedicels much longer than the petioles. Leaves not covered below with conspicuous reticulate veinlets, green on both surfaces, smooth or rough above; fruit dark purple. 1. C. occidentalis. Leaves covered below with a network of prominent veinlets, usually rough above. Leaves pale on the lower surface. Leaves broadly ovate, obliquely rounded at base, coarsely serrate, glabrous or slightly pilose below along the midrib and veins; fruit light orange-brown, the pedicels often 3 or 4 times longer than the petioles. 2. C. Douglasii. Leaves oblong-ovate, mostly cordate or occasionally rounded at base, entire or slightly serrate toward the apex, covered below with pilose pubescence; fruit dark reddish brown, the pedicels usually not more than twice as long as the petioles. 3. C. Lindheimeri. Leaves green on the lower surface, broadly ovate, obliquely rounded at base, entire, pubescent along the midrib and veins below, rarely smooth on the upper surface; fruit dark orange-red, the pedicels usually not more than twice as long as the petioles. 4. C. reticulata. Fruit on pedicels shorter or only slightly longer than the petioles. Leaves oblong-lanceolate, long-acuminate, unsymmetrically cuneate at base, often falcate, entire or more or less serrate, smooth or rarely roughened on the upper surface; fruit orange color or yellow, the pedicels shorter or somewhat longer than the petioles. 5. C. laevigata. Leaves ovate-lanceolate, acute or acuminate, obliquely rounded at base, coarsely serrate or nearly entire, smooth or in var. georgiana roughened on the upper surface; fruit dark orange red, the pedicels usually shorter than the petioles. 6. C. pumila.

1. Celtis occidentalis L. Hackberry. Sugarberry.

Leaves ovate, short-acuminate or acute at apex, obliquely rounded at base, sharply serrate often only above the middle, thin, slightly pubescent below on the slender midrib and veins early in the season, becoming glabrous or nearly glabrous, 2½′—3½′ long, 1½′—2′ wide; turning yellow late in the autumn; petioles slender, glabrous, ⅓′—½′ in length. Flowers on drooping pedicels; calyx divided usually into 5 linear acute thin and scarious lobes rounded on the back, more or less laciniately cut, and often furnished with a tuft of pale hairs at apex; torus hoary-tomentose. Fruit on stems ½′—¾′ long, ripening in September and October and often remaining on the branches during the winter, subglobose, ovoid or obovoid, dark purple, ⅓′ in diameter, with a thick tough skin, dark orange-colored flesh and a thick-walled oblong pointed light brown slightly rugose nutlet; seed pale brown.

A tree, rarely more than 40°—50° high with a trunk usually not more than 2° in diameter, spreading often pendulous branches forming a round-topped head, and slender ridged light brown glabrous branchlets marked by oblong pale lenticels, and by horizontal semioval or oblong leaf-scars showing the ends of three fibro-vascular bundles, becoming darker and in their second or third year often dark red-brown. Winter-buds ovoid, pointed, flattened, about ¼′ long, with three pairs of chestnut-brown ovate acute pubescent caducous scales closely imbricated in two ranks, increasing in size from without inward. Bark 1′—1½′ thick, smooth, dark brown, and more or less thickly covered and roughened by irregular, wart-like excrescences or by long ridges also found on the large branches. Wood heavy, rather soft, not strong, coarse-grained, clear light yellow, with thick lighter-colored sapwood; used for fencing and in the manufacture of cheap furniture.

Distribution. Rocky hills and ridges; New England (rare) to Virginia and westward to Iowa, eastern North Dakota, southwestern Missouri and northwestern Kansas.

Often planted in some of its forms as a shade and ornamental tree in the towns of the Mississippi valley and occasionally in the eastern states and in Europe.

Well distinguished by its large dark fruit, Celtis occidentalis is so variable in the shape of its leaves that two principal varieties are described as follows:

Celtis occidentalis var. canina Sarg. Hackberry.

Celtis canina Raf.

Leaves oblong-ovate, gradually narrowed into a long acuminate point, obliquely rounded or unsymmetrically cuneate at base, finely serrate, glabrous or rarely pilose along the midrib and veins below, 2½′—6′ long and ¾′—2½′ wide; petioles slender, glabrous or rarely pubescent, ½′—¾′ long.

A tree, often 80°—100° high; more common than the other forms of Celtis occidentalis.

Distribution. Rich wooded slopes and bottoms, or eastward on rocky ridges; Province of Quebec to eastern Nebraska, and southward to the coast of Massachusetts, western New York, southern Ohio, southern Indiana and Illinois, southwestern Missouri, southwestern Oklahoma (Snyder, Kiowa County), and in northwestern Georgia.

Celtis occidentalis var. crassifolia A. Gray. Hackberry.

Celtis crassifolia Lam.

Leaves thicker, long-acuminate, obliquely rounded at base, usually more coarsely serrate, rarely nearly entire, rough on the upper surface, pilose below along the prominent midrib and veins, 3½′—5′ long, 2′—2½′ wide, much smaller in the Rocky Mountain region; petioles villose-pubescent, rarely glabrous, ¼′—½′ in length, much shorter than the pubescent pedicels of the fruit.

A tree, 100°—120° high; with pubescent or glabrous branchlets; rarely shrubby. The most widely distributed form of Celtis occidentalis.

Distribution. Wooded slopes and rich bottoms; Virginia and along the Appalachian Mountains to North Carolina and westward to southern Minnesota, Missouri, central Kansas, eastern and northwestern Oklahoma, central Nebraska, North and South Dakota, cañons of the Big Horn Mountains, Wyoming, and northwestern Idaho, and southward to Dallas County, Alabama, and eastern Texas.

Often cultivated in towns of the Mississippi Valley and in western Europe, and occasionally in the eastern states.

2. Celtis Douglasii Plan. Hackberry.

Celtis rugulosa Rydb.

Leaves broadly ovate to oblong-ovate, acuminate, obliquely rounded or unsymmetrically subcordate at base, coarsely serrate, rough on the upper surface, pale and covered below with a network of reticulate veinlets inconspicuous early in the season, later becoming prominent, glabrous or sparingly pilose along the under side of the stout midrib and primary veins, 2′—2½′ long, 1′—2′ wide; petioles stout, slightly pubescent, ¼′—½′ in length. Flowers on slender pubescent pedicels; calyx divided into five linear acute scarious lobes laciniately cut at apex; torus hoary-tomentose. Fruit on slender drooping slightly pubescent or glabrous pedicels, ⅓′—½′ in length, subglobose to ellipsoid, light orange-brown, lustrous, ⅓′ in diameter.

A small tree or shrub rarely more than 20′ high, with slender slightly pubescent or glabrous red-brown branchlets marked by small pale lenticels, becoming ashy gray in their second or third year. Bark rough, red-brown or gray.

Distribution. Dry hillsides and rocky river banks; eastern Oregon from the valley of the Deschutes and Columbia Rivers to the cañon of Snake River, Whitman County, Washington, and to Big Willow Creek, Cañon County, western Idaho; on the western foothills of the Wasatch Mountains, in the cañon of Grand River, and in Diamond Valley, Utah; southern California, near Independence, Inyo County, Hackberry Cañon, Kern County, and Things Valley at base of Laguna Mountain, near Campo, southern San Diego County; on Cedros Island, and in northern Lower California; rim of the Grand Cañon, Arizona, and on the eastern foothills of the Rocky Mountains of Colorado.

Occasionally planted in the towns of western Washington, and when cultivated said to grow in good soil into a larger and more shapely tree with thinner leaves.

3. Celtis Lindheimeri K. Koch. Palo Blanco.

Celtis Helleri Small.

Leaves oblong-ovate, acuminate or acute, cordate or obliquely cordate or rounded at base, entire, or crenately serrate on vigorous shoots, rough above, pale and clothed below with white hairs, becoming by midsummer thick and covered below with a conspicuous network of reticulate veinlets, 1½′—3′ long, ¾′—2′ wide; petioles densely villose-pubescent, ¼′—½′ in length. Flowers opening toward the end of March on pubescent pedicels; calyx divided into five oblong scarious lobes narrowed and rounded at apex; torus tomentose. Fruit on slender tomentose stems ¼′—⅔′ long, ripening in September and persistent on the branches until spring, subglobose to ellipsoid, dark reddish brown, lustrous, ¼′ in diameter.

A tree, occasionally 30° high, with a trunk rarely more than 12′—18′ in diameter, stout spreading branches forming a broad open irregular head, and slender pubescent branchlets roughened by numerous small lenticels, becoming darker and glabrous in their second season. Bark of the trunk and large branches dark and covered with high thick wart-like excrescences and ridges. Wood not strong nor durable, of little value even for fuel.

Distribution. Rich bottom-lands and on low adjacent hills of streams flowing southward from the Edward’s Plateau (Goliad, San Antonio, New Braunfels, San Marcos) and near Austin, Travis County, Texas.

4. Celtis reticulata Torr. Hackberry.

Leaves broadly ovate, acute or acuminate, obliquely rounded at base, entire, thick, dark green and rough or rarely smooth on the upper surface, yellow-green and conspicuously reticulate-venulose and sparingly pilose along the prominent midrib and veins on the lower surface, 1¼′—3′ long, ¾′—1½′ wide; petioles stout, ⅛′—¼′ in length, more or less densely pubescent. Flowers not seen. Fruit on pubescent pedicels ⅓′—½′ in length, ripening in September, subglobose to ellipsoid, orange-red or yellow, lustrous, ¼′ in diameter.

A tree, rarely 30° high with stout ascending branches forming an open irregular head, and slender red-brown branchlets tomentose or pubescent early in their first season and pubescent or glabrous in their second year; or often a shrub. Bark thick and rough.

Distribution. Dry limestone hillsides, rocky ridges and cañon slopes, western Texas, from the valley of the upper Rio Frio, Uvalde County, to Oklahoma (Ozark region, near Page, Le Flore County to the southwestern borders of the state); in mountain ravines through southern New Mexico, and in southern central and northeastern Arizona.

A variety with more pubescent serrate leaves, those on vigorous shoots mostly cordate at base and covered above with short white hairs, is distinguished as var. vestita Sarg. A small tree with slender pubescent branchlets and a trunk 12′—15′ in diameter. In low ground, along the North Fork of the Canadian River, near Canton, Blaine County, Oklahoma.

5. Celtis laevigata K. Koch. Sugarberry. Hackberry.

Celtis mississippiensis Spach.

Leaves oblong-lanceolate, long-pointed and acuminate at apex, unsymmetrically rounded or cuneate or obliquely cuneate at base, often falcate, entire or furnished with a few teeth near the apex or serrate (var. Smallii Sarg.), thin, smooth, glabrous or rarely rough above, light green on both surfaces, 2½′—5′ long and ¾′—1½′ wide, with a narrow yellow midrib, slender veins arcuate and united near the margins, and inconspicuous reticulate veinlets; petioles slender, glabrous, ¼′—½′ in length. Flowers on slender glabrous pedicels; calyx divided into five ovate-lanceolate glabrous or puberulous scarious lobes furnished at apex with tufts of long white hairs. Fruit on glabrous pedicels shorter or slightly longer than the petioles, ripening in September, short-oblong to ellipsoid or obovoid, orange-red or yellow, ¼′ in diameter; nutlet slightly rugose.

A tree, 60°—80° high, with a trunk 2°—3° in diameter, spreading or pendulous branches forming a broad head, and slender branchlets light green, glabrous or pubescent when they first appear, and during their first winter bright reddish brown, rather lustrous and marked by oblong pale lenticels and narrow elevated horizontal leaf-scars showing the ends of three fibro-vascular bundles; often much smaller. Winter-buds ovoid, pointed, 1/16′—⅛′ long, with chestnut-brown puberulous scales. Bark ½′—⅔′ thick, pale gray and covered with prominent excrescences. Wood soft, not strong, close-grained, light yellow, with thick lighter-colored sapwood; commercially confounded with the wood of Celtis occidentalis and its varieties, and used for the same purposes.

Distribution. Coast of Virginia to the Everglades Keys of southern Florida, through the Gulf states to the valley of the lower Rio Grande in Nuevo Leon, and through eastern Texas, Arkansas and Missouri to eastern Oklahoma to the valley of the Washita River (Zarvin County) and to Kiowa County, eastern Kansas, central Tennessee and Kentucky, and to southern Illinois and Indiana; in Bermuda.

Often planted as a shade and street tree in the valley of the Mississippi River and in Texas.

An arborescent form from the rocky banks of the Nueces River, western Texas, with shorter and thicker leaves is distinguished as var. brachyphylla Sarg.; and a small shrubby form with oblong-ovate cordate leaves and dark purplish fruit covered with a glaucous bloom, growing in deep sand in Callihan County, Texas, has been described as var. anomala Sarg. An Arizona form is

Celtis laevigata var. brevipes Sarg.

Celtis brevipes S. Wats.

Leaves ovate, acuminate, unsymmetrically rounded or cuneate at base, entire or rarely furnished with occasional teeth, glabrous, dark green and smooth on the upper surface, yellow-green on the lower surface, with small clusters of pale hairs in the axils of the slender veins, and inconspicuous reticulate veinlets, 1½′—2′ long, ¾′—1′ wide; petioles slender, puberulous, ¼′—⅓′ in length. Fruit on glabrous pedicels shorter or slightly longer than the petioles, short-oblong, canary yellow, about ¼′ long.

A small tree with slender glabrous red-brown branchlets.

Distribution. Central and southern Arizona.

More distinct is the common Celtis of western Texas which has been described as

Celtis laevigata var. texana Sarg.

Leaves ovate to lanceolate, acuminate, unsymmetrically rounded or cordate at base, entire or sparingly and irregularly serrate, often subcoriaceous, dark green, smooth and granulate or rarely rough above, green below, with a slender midrib and primary veins glabrous or sparingly villose-pubescent and furnished with small tufts of axillary hairs, and only slightly raised reticulate veinlets, 1½′—3′ long and ¾′—1½′ wide; petioles slender, pale pubescent, ⅕′—¼′ in length. Fruit on glabrous or puberulous pedicels slightly longer than the petioles, subglobose but rather longer than broad, dark orange-red, about ¼′ long.

An arborescent shrub or small tree rarely more than 25° high, with slender reddish glabrous or gray-brown pubescent branchlets; often growing in clusters. Bark rough, pale or grayish and not often covered with wart-like excrescences.

Distribution. Rocky bluffs near Dallas to New Braunfels, Texas, and westward to western Oklahoma, and southern New Mexico; in southwestern Missouri; in Tamaulipas and Coahuila, Mexico. The common Celtis of the Texas Panhandle.

A shrubby form from Nolan County, Texas, with red-brown branchlets densely pubescent in their first season, becoming puberulous during their second year, and smaller leaves with more prominent reticulate veinlets, on densely pubescent petioles, is distinguished as forma microphylla Sarg.

6. Celtis pumila Pursh.

This shrub of the eastern states is sometimes a small tree in its southern variety,

Celtis pumila var. georgiana Sarg.

Leaves ovate, acute or acuminate, obliquely rounded at base, entire or sharply serrate, especially on vigorous leading shoots, thin, dark green and rough on the upper surface, pale and more or less pubescent or nearly glabrous along the midrib and veins below, 1½′—2½′ long and ¾′—1½′ wide; petioles slender, pubescent, ⅙′—¼′ in length. Flowers on pubescent pedicels; calyx divided into usually five lanceolate acuminate lobes; the disk pubescent. Fruit on pubescent pedicels as long or slightly longer than the petioles, subglobose, reddish purple, often covered with a glaucous bloom, ½′ in diameter; nutlet covered with conspicuous reticulate ridges.

A shrub or small tree occasionally 30° high, with slender dark red-brown pubescent branchlets, light red-brown and sometimes bright red-brown before the end of their first year.

Distribution. Piedmont region of North and South Carolina, central Georgia to western Florida; and Dallas County, Alabama; in southern Missouri, and southern Illinois.

4. TREMA Lour.

Unarmed trees and shrubs with watery juices and terete branchlets. Leaves alternate, often two-ranked, serrate, penniveined, three-nerved from the base, short-petiolate, persistent; stipules lateral, free, usually small, caducous. Flowers apetalous, small, monœcious, diœcious or rarely perfect, in axillary cymes; calyx five or rarely four-parted, the lobes induplicate, valvate or slightly imbricated in the bud, or in perfect flowers more or less concave and induplicate; stamens five or rarely four, opposite the calyx-lobes and inserted on their base, occasionally present in the pistillate flower; filaments short, erect; anthers oblong, attached on the back near the base, introrse, two-celled, the cells opening longitudinally; ovary sessile, rudimentary or wanting in the staminate flower; style central, slightly or entirely divided into two linear fleshy stigmatic branches; ovule solitary, pendulous from the apex of the cell, anatropous; micropyle superior. Fruit drupaceous, short-oblong to subglobose, crowned by the persistent style; exocarp more or less fleshy; endocarp hard; seed filling the cavity of the nutlet; testa membranaceous, albumen fleshy, often scanty; embryo curved or slightly involute; cotyledons narrow; radicle incurved, ascending.

Trema, with about twenty species, is widely distributed in tropical and subtropical regions of the two hemispheres. Two species reach the coast region and the keys of southern Florida. Of these Trema mollis Lour. is a small tree, and Trema Lamarckiana Bl., which in Florida has been noticed only on Key Largo, where it grows as a small shrub, is widely distributed over the Bahamas and many of the West Indian islands.

1. Trema mollis Lour.

Trema floridana Britt.

Leaves 2-ranked, ovate, abruptly acuminate at apex, rounded, cordate and often oblique at base, finely serrate with incurved or rounded apiculate teeth, dark green and scabrate above, covered with pale tomentum below, 3′—4′ long, 1′—2½′ wide; petioles stout, tomentose, about ⅖′ in length; stipules narrow, acuminate, covered with long white hairs, about one third as long as the petioles. Flowers in early spring, subtended by minute scarious deciduous bracts on short slender pedicels in bisexual many-flowered pedunculate villose cymes about as long as the petioles; calyx 5-lobed, the lobes oblong, acute and incurved at apex, villose on the outer surface; staminate with glabrous filaments and slightly exserted yellow anthers; pistillate with a style divided to the base. Fruit short-oblong, pale yellowish brown, ⅙′—⅕′ in diameter.

A fast-growing short-lived tree, in Florida occasionally 25°—30° high, with a tall trunk 1½′—2½′ in diameter, small crowded branches ascending at narrow angles, and stout hoary-tomentose red-brown 2-ranked branchlets. Bark thin, chocolate-brown, roughened by numerous small wart-like excrescences, and separating into small appressed papery scales.

Distribution. Rich hummocks; near the shores of Bay Biscayne, in the Everglades, and on the southern keys, Florida; common; often springing up where the ground has been burned over, or otherwise cleared of its forests; on many of the West Indian islands and in Mexico.

XII. MORACEÆ.

Tree or shrubs, with milky juice, scaly or naked buds, and stalked alternate simple leaves with stipules. Flowers monœcious or diœcious, in ament-like spikes, or in heads on the outside of a receptacle or on the inside of a closed receptacle; calyx of the staminate flower 2—6-lobed or parted; stamens 1—4, inserted on the base of the calyx; calyx of the pistillate flower of 2—6 partly united sepals; ovary 1—2-celled; styles 1 or 2; ovule pendulous. Fruits drupaceous, inclosed in the thickened calyx of the flower and united into a compound fruit (syncarp). The Mulberry family is widely distributed with fifty-four genera confined largely to the warmer parts of the world. Three genera only, all arborescent, are indigenous in North America, although Broussonetia papyrifera Vent., the Paper Mulberry, a tree related to the Mulberry and a native of eastern Asia, and the Hop and the Hemp are more or less generally naturalized in the eastern and southern states.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN GENERA.

Flowers on the outside of the receptacle; buds scaly. Flowers in ament-like spikes; syncarp oblong and succulent. 1. Morus. Staminate flowers racemose, the pistillate capitate; syncarp dry and globose. 2. Maclura. Flowers on the inside of a closed receptacle; buds naked; syncarp subglobose to ovoid, succulent. 3. Ficus.

1. MORUS L. Mulberry.

Trees or shrubs, with slender terete unarmed branches prolonged by one of the upper axillary buds, scaly bark, fibrous roots, and winter-buds covered by ovate scales closely imbricated in 2 ranks, increasing in size from without inward, the inner accrescent, marking in falling the base of the branch with ring-like scars. Leaves conduplicate in the bud, alternate, serrate, entire or 3-lobed, 3—5-nerved at base, membranaceous or subcoriaceous, deciduous; stipules inclosing their leaf in the bud, lateral, lanceolate, acute, caducous. Flowers monœcious or diœcious, the staminate and pistillate on different branches of the same plant or on different plants, minute, vernal, in pedunculate clusters from the axils of caducous bud-scales or of the lower leaves of the year; staminate in elongated cylindric spikes; calyx deeply divided into 4 equal rounded lobes; stamens 4, inserted opposite the lobes of the calyx under the minute rudimentary ovary, filaments filiform, incurved in the bud, straightening elastically and becoming exserted, anthers attached on the back below the middle, introrse, 2-celled, the cells reniform, attached laterally to the orbicular connective, opening longitudinally; pistillate sessile, in short-oblong densely flowered spikes; calyx 4-parted, the lobes ovate or obovate, thickened, often unequal, the 2 outer broader than the others, persistent; ovary ovoid, flat, sessile, included in the calyx, crowned by a central style divided nearly to the base into 2 equal spreading filiform villose white stigmatic lobes; ovule suspended from the apex of the cell, campylotropous; micropyle superior. Drupes ovoid or obovoid, crowned with the remnants of the styles, inclosed in the succulent thickened and colored perianth of the flower and more or less united into a more or less juicy compound fruit; flesh subsucculent, thin; walls of the nutlet thin or thick, crustaceous. Seed oblong, pendulous; testa, thin, membranaceous; hilum minute, apical; embryo incurved in thick fleshy albumen; cotyledons oblong, equal; radicle ascending, incumbent.

Morus with eight or nine species is confined to eastern temperate North America, the elevated regions of Mexico, Central America and western South America, southern and western Asia, Indo-China, China, Japan, the Bonin Islands and the mountains of the Indian Archipelago. Two species occur in North America. The most valuable species, Morus alba L., a native of China and Formosa, and largely cultivated in many countries for its leaves, which are the best food of the silkworm, has been planted in large quantities in the eastern United States; and Morus nigra L., probably a native of Persia, has been introduced into the southern and Pacific states for its large dark-colored juicy fruit. Morus produces straight-grained durable light brown or orange-colored valuable wood, and sweet acidulous and refreshing fruits.

Morus is the classical name of the Mulberry-tree.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES.

Leaves coated below with pale pubescence; lobes of the stigma long; syncarp oblong, dark purple. 1. M. rubra (A, C). Leaves glabrous or pubescent below; lobes of the stigma short; syncarp subglobose or short-ovoid, nearly black. 2. M. microphylla (C, E, H).

1. Morus rubra L. Red Mulberry.

Leaves ovate, oblong-ovate or semiorbicular, abruptly contracted into a long broad point or acute at apex, more or less deeply cordate or occasionally truncate at base, coarsely and occasionally doubly serrate with incurved callous-tipped teeth, often, especially on vigorous young shoots, 3-lobed by broad deep oblique lateral rounded sinuses, when they unfold yellow-green, slightly pilose on the upper surface and hoary-tomentose on the lower surface, at maturity thin, dark bluish green, glabrous, smooth or scabrate above, pale and more or less pubescent below with short white hairs thickest on the orange-colored midrib, and on the primary veins arcuate and united near the margins and connected by reticulate veinlets, or sometimes hoary-tomentose below (var. tomentosa Bureau), 3′—5′ long, 2½′—4′ wide; turning bright yellow in the autumn; petioles stout, hoary-tomentose at first, becoming glabrous, ¾′—1¼′ in length; stipules lanceolate, acute, abruptly enlarged and thickened at base, sometimes tinged with red above the middle, coated with long white hairs, and often 1′ in length. Flowers appearing with the unfolding of the leaves; staminate in narrow spikes 2′—2½′ long, on stout light green peduncles covered with pale hairs; calyx divided nearly to the base into oblong concave lobes rounded at apex and hirsute on the outer surface; stamens with slightly flattened filaments narrowed from the base to the apex, and bright green anthers, their connectives orbicular, conspicuous, bright green; pistillate in oblong densely flowered spikes, 1′ long, on short hairy peduncles, a few male flowers being sometimes mixed with them; calyx divided nearly to the base into 4 thick concave lobes rounded at apex, rounded or slightly keeled on the back, the 2 outer lobes twice as wide as the others, as long as and closely investing the glabrous light green ovary. Fruit: syncarp at first bright red when fully grown, 1′—1¼′ long, becoming dark purple or nearly black and sweet and juicy when fully ripe; drupes about 1/32′ long, with a thin fleshy outer coat and a light brown nutlet; seed ovoid, acute, with a thin membranaceous light brown coat.

A tree, 60°—70° high, with a short trunk rarely exceeding 3°—4° in diameter, stout spreading smooth branches forming a dense broad round-topped shapely head, and slender slightly zigzag branchlets dark green often tinged with red, glabrous, more or less coated with pale pubescence, and covered with oblong straw-colored spots when they first appear, becoming in their first winter light red-brown to orange color and marked by pale lenticels and by large elevated horizontal nearly orbicular concave leaf-scars displaying a row of prominent fibro-vascular bundle-scars, and in their second and third years dark brown slightly tinged with red. Winter-buds ovoid, rounded or pointed at apex, ¼′ long, with 6 or 7 chestnut-brown scales, those of the outer rows broadly ovate, rounded, and slightly thickened on the back, puberulous, ciliate on the margins, and much shorter than those of the next rows, the inner scales scarious, coated with pale hairs, oblong-lanceolate, rounded or acute at apex, and ½′—⅔′ long at maturity. Bark ½′—¾′ thick, dark brown tinged with red and divided into irregular elongated plates separating on the surface into thick appressed scales. Wood light, soft, not strong, rather tough, coarse-grained, very durable, light orange color, with thick lighter colored sapwood; largely used for fencing, in cooperage, and in boat-building.

Distribution. Intervales in rich soil and on low hills; western Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Long Island to southern Ontario, central Michigan, southeastern Minnesota, eastern Iowa, southeastern South Dakota, eastern Nebraska, central Kansas and Oklahoma, and southward to the shores of Bay Biscayne and Cape Romano, Florida, and to the cañon of the Devil’s River, Valverde County, Texas; most abundant and of its largest size in the basin of the lower Ohio River and on the foothills of the southern Appalachian Mountains; ascending to altitudes of 2000°.

Occasionally planted, especially in the southern states, for its fruit valued for fattening hogs and as food for poultry. A few natural varieties, distinguished for the large size and good quality of their fruit, or for their productiveness, are occasionally propagated by pomologists.

2. Morus microphylla Buckl. Mulberry. Mexican Mulberry.

Morus celtidifolia Sarg., not H. B. K.

Leaves ovate, acute or acuminate, rounded or rarely truncate, or often on vigorous shoots cordate at the broad base, and 3-lobed with shallow lateral sinuses and broad coarsely serrate lobes, when they unfold coated below with pale tomentum, and puberulous above, at maturity thin and firm in texture, dark green and often roughened on the upper surface by minute pale tubercles, and paler, smooth or scabrate, and glabrous or coated with soft pubescence on the lower surface, and often hirsute with short stiff pale hairs on the broad orange-colored midrib, and on the primary veins connected by conspicuous reticulate veinlets, rarely more than 1½′ long and ¾′ wide; turning yellow in the autumn; petioles slender, hoary-tomentose, becoming pubescent, ⅓′ in length; stipules linear-lanceolate, acute, sometimes falcate, white and scarious, coated with soft pale tomentum, about ½′ long. Flowers usually diœcious, staminate short-pedicellate, in short many-flowered spikes, ½′—¾′ long; calyx dark green, covered on the outer surface with soft pale hairs, deeply divided into equal rounded lobes reddish toward the apex; stamens with bright yellow anthers, their connectives conspicuous, dark green; pistillate sessile in few-flowered spikes, rarely ⅓′ in length; calyx divided to the base into thick rounded lobes, the 2 outer lobes much broader than the others, dark green, covered with pale scattered hairs; ovary green and glabrous, with short stigmatic lobes. Fruit: syncarp ½′ long, red becoming dark purple or nearly black, sweet and palatable; drupe ⅙′ long, ovoid, rounded at the ends, with a thin fleshy outer covering and a thick-walled light brown nutlet; seed ovoid, pointed, pale yellow.

A tree, sometimes 15°—20° high, with a trunk occasionally 12′—14′ in diameter, and slender branchlets covered when they first appear with soft white hairs, soon becoming glabrous or nearly so, and in their first winter light orange-red and marked by small lenticels and small horizontal nearly orbicular elevated concave leaf-scars displaying a ring of fibro-vascular bundle-scars; often a shrub. Winter-buds ovoid, acute, sharp-pointed, and covered by thin lustrous chestnut-brown ovate rounded scales scarious on the margins, those of the inner rows ovate-oblong, rounded at apex, pale-pubescent on the outer surface, and nearly 1′ long when fully grown. Bark smooth, sometimes nearly ½′ thick but usually thinner, light gray slightly tinged with red, deeply furrowed and broken on the surface into slightly appressed scales. Wood heavy, hard, close-grained, dark orange color or sometimes dark brown, with thick light-colored sapwood.

Distribution. Dry limestone hills, or westward only in elevated mountain cañons in the neighborhood of streams; valley of the Colorado River, Texas, southward into Mexico and through the mountain regions of western Texas and southern New Mexico to the Santa Rita Mountains and the cañons of the Colorado Plateau, Arizona.

2. MACLURA Nutt.

Toxylon (Ioxylon) Rafn.

A tree, with thick milky slightly acrid juice, thick deeply furrowed dark orange-colored bark, stout tough terete pale branchlets, with thick orange-colored pith, lengthening by an upper axillary bud, marked by pale orange-colored lenticels and armed with stout straight axillary spines, short stout spur-like lateral branchlets from buds at the base of the spines, and thick fleshy roots covered by bright orange-colored bark exfoliating freely in long thin persistent papery scales. Leaves involute in the bud, ovate to oblong-lanceolate, acuminate and apiculate at apex, rounded, cuneate or subcordate at base, entire, penniveined, the veins arcuate near the margins and connected by conspicuous reticulate veinlets; petioles elongated, slender, terete, pubescent; stipules lateral, nearly triangular, minute, hoary-tomentose, caducous. Flowers diœcious, light green, minute, appearing in early summer; calyx 4-lobed, the lobes imbricated in æstivation; the staminate long pedicellate, in short or ultimately elongated racemes borne on long slender drooping peduncles from the axils of crowded leaves on the spur-like branchlets of the previous year; calyx ovoid, gradually narrowed into the slender pubescent pedicel, coated on the outer surface with pale hairs, divided to the middle into equal acute boat-shaped lobes; stamens 4, inserted opposite the lobes of the calyx on the margins of the minute thin pulvinate disk; filaments flattened, light green, glabrous, infolded above the middle in the bud, with the anthers inverted and back to back, straightening abruptly in anthesis and becoming exserted; anthers oblong, attached on the back near the middle, introrse, 2-celled, the cells attached laterally to a minute oblong or semiorbicular connective, free and spreading above and below, opening by longitudinal lateral slits; pistillate sessile in dense globose many-flowered heads on short stout peduncles axillary on shoots of the year; calyx ovoid, divided to the base into oblong thick concave lobes, rounded, thickened, and covered with pale hairs at the apex, longer than the ovary and closely investing it, the 2 outer lobes much broader than the others, persistent and inclosing the fruit; ovary ovoid, compressed, sessile, green, and glabrous; style covered by elongated slender filiform white stigmatic hairs; ovule suspended from the apex of the cell, anatropous. Drupes oblong, compressed, rounded and often notched at apex, acute at base, with thin succulent flesh, and a thin crustaceous light brown nutlet, joined by the union of the thickened and much elongated perianths of the flowers into a globose compound fruit saturated with milky juice, mammillate on the surface by their thickened rounded summits, light yellow-green, usually of full size but seedless on isolated pistillate individuals. Seed oblong, compressed, rounded at base, oblique and marked at apex by the conspicuous oblong pale hilum, without albumen; seed-coat membranaceous, light chestnut-brown; embryo recurved; cotyledons oblong, nearly equal; radicle elongated, incumbent, ascending.

The genus is represented by a single species of eastern North America.

The generic name is in compliment to William Maclure, distinguished geologist.

1. Maclura pomifera Schn. Osage Orange. Bow Wood.

Toxylon (Ioxylon) pomiferum Rafn.

Leaves 3′—5′ long, 2′—3′ wide; turning bright clear yellow before falling in the autumn; petioles 1½′—2′ in length. Flowers: racemes of the staminate flowers 1′—1½′ long; heads of the pistillate flowers, ¾′—1′ in diameter. Fruit 4′—5′ in diameter, ripening in the autumn, and soon falling to the ground.

A tree, sometimes 50°—60° high, with a short trunk 2°—3° in diameter, and stout erect ultimately spreading branches forming a handsome open irregular round-topped head, and branchlets light green often tinged with red and coated with soft pale pubescence when they first appear, soon becoming glabrous, light brown slightly tinged with orange color during their first winter, and ultimately paler. Winter-buds depressed-globose, partly immersed in the bark, covered by few closely imbricated ovate rounded light chestnut-brown ciliate conspicuous scales. Bark ⅔′—1′ thick, and deeply and irregularly divided into broad rounded ridges separating on the surface into thin appressed scales. Wood heavy, exceedingly hard, very strong, flexible, coarse-grained, very durable, bright orange color turning brown on exposure, with thin light yellow sapwood of 5—10 layers of annual growth; largely used for fence-posts, railway-ties, wheel-stock, and formerly by the Osage and other Indians west of the Mississippi River for bows and war-clubs. The bark of the roots contains moric and morintannic acid, and is used as a yellow dye. The bark of the trunk is sometimes used in tanning leather.

Distribution. Rich bottom-lands; southern Arkansas to southern Oklahoma and southward in Texas to about latitude 35° 36′; most abundant and of its largest size in the valley of the Red River in Oklahoma.

Largely planted in the prairie regions of the Mississippi basin as a hedge plant, and occasionally in the eastern states; hardy in New England; occasionally naturalized beyond the limits of its natural range.

3. FICUS L. Fig.

Trees, with milky juice, naked buds, stout branchlets, thick fleshy roots frequently produced from the branches and developing into supplementary stems. Leaves involute, entire and persistent in American species; stipules inclosing the leaf in a slender sharp-pointed bud-like cover, interpetiolar, embracing the leaf-bearing axis and inclosing the young leaves, deciduous. Flower-bearing receptacle subglobose to ovoid, sessile or stalked, solitary by abortion or in pairs in the axils of existing or fallen leaves, surrounded at base by 3 anterior bracts distinct or united into an involucral cup bearing on the interior at the apex numerous rows of minute triangular viscid bracts closing the orifice, those of the lower rows turned downward and infolding the upper flowers, those immediately above these horizontal and forming a more or less prominent umbilicus. Flowers sessile or pedicellate, the pedicels thickening and becoming succulent with the ripening of the fruit, unisexual, often separated by chaffy scales or hairs; calyx of the staminate flower usually divided into 2—6 sepals; stamen 1; filament short, erect; anther innate, ovoid, broad and subrotund, 2-celled, the cells opening longitudinally, 0 in the pistillate flower; sepals or lobes of the calyx of the pistillate flower usually narrower than those of the staminate flower; ovary sessile, erect or oblique, surmounted by the lateral elongated style crowned by a 2-lobed stigma; ovule suspended from the apex or lateral below the apex of the cell, anatropous. Fruit mostly immersed in the thickened succulent receptacle, obovoid or reniform; flesh thin, mucilaginous; nutlet with a flat crustaceous minutely tuberculate shell. Seed suspended; testa membranaceous; embryo incurved, in thin fleshy albumen, cotyledons equal or unequal, longer than the incumbent radicle.

Ficus, of which about six hundred species have been described, is largely distributed through the topics of both hemispheres, the largest number of species being found on the islands of the Indian Archipelago and the Pacific Ocean. A few species extend beyond the tropics into southern Florida, Mexico, Argentina, southern Japan and China, the countries bordering the Mediterranean, the Canary Islands, and South Africa. Two species of the section Urostigma with monœcious flowers occur in tropical Florida. Ficus Carica L., probably a native of the Mediterranean basin, is cultivated in the southern states and in California for its large sweet succulent fruits, the figs of commerce.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES.

Receptacles subglobose, sessile or short-stalked; leaves oblong, usually pointed at the ends. 1. F. aurea (D). Receptacles obovoid, long-stalked; leaves broadly ovate, cordate at base. 2. F. brevifolia (D).

1. Ficus aurea Nutt. Wild Fig.

Leaves oblong, usually narrowed at the ends, acute or acuminate, with a short broad point at apex, cuneate or rarely broad and rounded at base, 2′—5′ long, 1½′—3′ wide, thick and coriaceous, dark yellow-green and lustrous above, paler and less lustrous below, with a broad light yellow midrib slightly grooved on the upper side, and numerous obscure primary veins arcuate and united near the margins and connected by fine closely reticulated veinlets, continuing to unfold during a large part of the year; usually falling during their second season; petioles stout, slightly grooved, ½′—1′ in length; stipules ovate-lanceolate, thick, firm, tinged with red, about 1′ long. Flowers: receptacles developing in succession as the branch lengthens, subglobose, sessile or short-stalked, solitary or in pairs, the orifice lateral closed and marked by a small point formed by the union of the minute bracts, becoming ⅓′ in diameter and yellow when fully grown, ultimately turning bright red; flowers reddish purple, separated by minute reddish chaff-like scales more or less laciniate at apex, sessile or long-pedicellate; calyx of the staminate flower divided to below the middle into 2 or 3 broad lobes rather shorter than the stout flattened filaments; lobes of the anther oblong, attached laterally to the broad connective; calyx of the pistillate flower divided to the middle into 4 or 5 narrow lobes, closely investing the ovate sessile ovary. Fruit ovoid, immersed in the thickened reddish purple walls of the receptacle; seed ovoid, rounded at the ends, with a thin light brown coat and a large lateral oblong pale hilum.

A broad round-topped epiphytal tree, 50°—60° high, germinating and growing at first on the branches and trunks of other trees and sending down to the ground stout aerial roots which gradually growing together form a trunk often 3°—4° in diameter, the growth of additional roots from the branches extending the tree over a large area, and terete pithy light orange-colored branchlets marked by pale lenticels, conspicuous stipular scars, large slightly elevated horizontal oval leaf-scars displaying a marginal ring of large pale fibro-vascular bundle-scars, and smaller elevated concave circular scars left by the receptacles in falling. Bark smooth, ashy gray, light brown tinged with red, ½′ thick, and broken on the surface into minute appressed scales disclosing in falling the nearly black inner bark. Wood exceedingly light, soft, weak, coarse-grained, perishable in contact with the ground, light brown, with thick lighter colored sapwood.

Distribution. Hummocks on the shores and islands of southern Florida; from the Indian River on the east coast and Tampa Bay on the west coast, to the southern keys; common and now rapidly spreading over the eastern and southern borders of the Everglades; attaining its largest size in the neighborhood of Bay Biscayne; on the Bahama Islands.

2. Ficus brevifolia Nutt. Fig. Wild Fig.

Ficus populnea Sarg., not Willd.

Leaves broadly ovate or rarely obovate, contracted into a short broad point or occasionally rounded at apex, rounded, truncate or cordate at base, 2½′—5′ long, 1½′—5′ wide, thin and firm, dark green and lustrous on the upper surface, paler on the lower, with a light yellow midrib, and slender remote primary veins arcuate and united near the margins and connected by finely reticulate veinlets; petioles slender, sometimes 1′ in length; stipules ovate-lanceolate, ½′ long, tinged with red. Flowers: receptacles obovoid, solitary or in pairs, yellow until fully grown, ultimately turning bright red and becoming ¼′—½′ long, on stout drooping stalks ¼′—1′ in length; flowers sessile or pedicellate, separated by minute chaff-like scales more or less laciniate at apex; calyx of the staminate flower divided nearly to the base into three or four broad acute lobes; calyx of the pistillate flower with narrow lobes shorter than the ovoid pointed ovary. Fruit ovoid; seed ovoid, with a membranaceous light brown coat and an oblong lateral pale hilum.

An epiphytal tree, rarely 40°—50° high, with a trunk 12′—18′ in diameter, spreading branches occasionally developing aerial roots and forming an open irregular head, and terete branchlets light red and slightly puberulous when they first appear, becoming brown tinged with orange and later with red, and marked by minute pale lenticels, narrow stipular scars, large elevated horizontal oval or semiorbicular leaf-scars showing a marginal row of conspicuous fibro-vascular bundle-scars, and elevated concave receptacle scars. Wood light, soft, close-grained, light orange-brown or yellow, with thick hardly distinguishable sapwood.

Distribution. Usually on dry slightly elevated coral rocks; Florida from the shores of Bay Biscayne to the Everglades Keys, and on several of the southern keys to Key West; not common; on the Bahama Islands and in Cuba.

XIII. OLACACEÆ.

Trees or shrubs, with watery juices, their stems sometimes twining, and alternate usually entire persistent leaves, without stipules. Flowers perfect or polygamous, in axillary cymes or racemes, rarely solitary; calyx 4 to 6-lobed; petals 4—6, inserted on a hypogynous disk, free or united into a campanulate or tubular corolla; stamens 4—12, inserted on the tube of the corolla; filaments free, rarely united; anthers oblong, introrse, opening longitudinally; ovary superior or partly inferior, free or immersed in the disk, 1—4-celled; styles mostly united; stigmas entire or lobed; ovules 1—3 in each cell of the ovary. Fruit drupaceous, naked or nearly inclosed in the enlarged disk, 1-celled, 1-seeded; seed pendulous; embryo minute, erect, in copious fleshly albumen; radicle superior.

Olacaceæ with twenty-five genera and a large number of species is confined to the tropics, and is most abundant in those of the Old World.

CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN ARBORESCENT GENERA.

Corolla-lobes short; stamens as many as its lobes; drupe almost inclosed in the enlarged disk of the flower; branches unarmed. 1. Schoepfia. Corolla-lobes elongated; stamens twice as many as its lobes; drupe nearly naked; branchlets armed. 2. Ximenia.

1. SCHOEPFIA Schreb.

Trees or shrubs with slender unarmed branchlets. Leaves entire, subcoriaceous, petiolate. Flowers small, perfect in axillary cymes, rarely solitary; calyx disciform, obscurely 4-toothed, or nearly entire, petals 4, 5 or rarely 6, united, their tips free, valvate; stamens opposite the petals, filaments free, anthers attached by the back; ovary partly immersed in the disk, 3-celled; style elongated, stigma 3-lobed; ovules 3 in each cell, pendulous from the free apex of the axile placentas. Fruit nearly inclosed in the enlarged disk of the flower, the stone crustaceous or chartaceous.

Schoepfia with twelve or fourteen species is distributed in the New World from southern Florida and Lower California to Brazil and Peru, and in the Old World from southern Japan and southern and western China to the East Indies and the eastern Himalayas.

The generic name is in compliment to Johann David Schoepf, German physician and botanist, and traveler in North America and the West Indies.

1. Schoepfia chrysophylloides Planch.

Schoepfia Schreberi Small, not Gmel.

Leaves elliptic to oblong-ovate, often slightly falcate, acuminate at apex, cuneate and often unsymmetric at base, light green and lustrous above, paler below, 1½′—3′ long, ¾′—1¼′ wide, and on vigorous shoots sometimes 4′ long and 1¾′ wide; petioles stout, wing-margined, ¼′—⅓′ in length. Flowers sessile, pink or red, in axillary 1—3- usually 2-flowered clusters on peduncles 1/24′—⅙′ in length; calyx cup-shaped, the rim slightly dilated, almost filled by the fleshy disk; corolla ovate-cylindric, ⅛′—⅙′ long, 4-lobed, the lobes ovate, acute, united, reflexed; stamens 4, adnate to the base of the lobes of the corolla; anthers sessile; ovary mostly immersed in the disk; style not more than 1/24′ long; Fruit ovoid or ovoid-oval scarlet, ⅖′—½′ in length; stone crustaceous; seed not seen.

A tree, sometimes 25°—30° high with a trunk 12′—18′ in diameter, small erect branches and slender pale gray unarmed branchlets. Bark thin, grayish brown, closely and regularly reticulated.

Distribution. In sandy or rocky soil; banks of the Caloosahatchee River, Lee County, near Miami and at Cocoanut Grove, Dade County, and on the southern keys, Florida; on the Bahama Islands, and in Cuba, Jamaica, and Guatamala.

2. XIMENIA L.

Trees and shrubs, with terete armed or unarmed branchlets. Leaves entire, subcoriaceous, often fascicled, short-petiolate. Flowers perfect, white, on slender pedicels, in short axillary cymes or rarely solitary; calyx small, 4-lobed, the lobes imbricated in the bud, persistent; petals 4 or 5, hypogynous, narrow, bearded on their inner face, valvate in the bud, reflexed above the middle; stamens twice as many as the petals; filaments free, filiform; anthers linear, attached on the back near the base, 2-celled, the cells opening laterally, their connective apiculate at apex; ovary 4-celled below, only the apex 1-celled, externally 4-grooved, glandular at base, gradually narrowed into the slender style; stigma entire, subcapitate; ovules linear, solitary in each cell, pendulous from the apex of the axile placenta, anatropous; raphe dorsal; micropyle superior. Fruit ovoid or globose; exocarp thick and succulent, endocarp crustaceous or subligneous; seed filling the cavity of the endocarp, pendulous, surrounded by a thin spongy coat; testa membranaceous; cotyledons elliptic; embryo minute, erect; raphe terete.

Ximenia with four or five species is widely distributed on tropical shores of the two worlds.

Ximenia commemorates the name of Francisco Ximenes, a Dominican priest who published in Mexico in 1615 a work on the plants and animals of that country.

1. Ximenia americana L.

Leaves oblong or elliptic, rounded and often emarginate and apiculate at apex, gradually narrowed and cuneate at base, glabrous, bright green and lustrous above, pale below, 1¼′—2½′ long, ⅗′—1¼′ wide, with slightly thickened revolute margins, a prominent midrib and obscure primary veins; petioles slender, narrow wing-margined at apex, ⅕′—⅖′ in length. Flowers bell-shaped, fragrant, about ¼′ long, on slender pedicels in the axils of minute acuminate caducous bractlets, in 3 or 4-flowered clusters on peduncles ⅕′—⅓′ long; calyx-lobes acute, petals elliptic and rounded or obtusely pointed at apex, yellowish white, leathery, conspicuously bearded on the inner surface from base nearly to apex. Fruit broad-ovoid to subglobose, bright yellow, with thin acid flesh, 1′—1¼′ long, on slender pedicels about ⅓′ in length, in usually 2 or 3-fruited drooping clusters; stone ovoid, apiculate at apex, covered with minute pits, light red; seed yellow, with bright orange-colored cotyledons.

A tree, occasionally 30° high, with a tall trunk 2½′—3½′ in diameter, spreading branches armed with stout straight spines usually ¾′—1′ in length, and slender branchlets slightly angled and light reddish brown when they first appear, becoming terete and light gray or red-brown and marked by numerous lenticels; more often a shrub with long vine-like stems. Bark close, dark red, astringent. Wood very heavy, tough, hard, close-grained, compact, brown tinged with red with lighter-colored sapwood. Hydrocyanic acid has been obtained from the fruit.

Distribution. Florida, near Eustis Lake, Lake County, to the southern keys, attaining its largest size on the west coast and on Long Key in the Everglades; common on the shores of the Antilles and southward to Brazil, and on those of west tropical Africa, the Indian peninsula, the islands of the Malay Archipelago, New Guinea, Australia, and on those of many of the islands of the south Pacific Ocean.