14 - Rhodora [JANUARY 
NUTTALL’S WHITE SASSAFRAS. 
M. L. FERNALD. 
THE common Sassafras of eastern North America, S. variifolium 
(Salisb.) Kuntze, based upon Laurus Sassafras L., has the young 
leaves densely pubescent, the mature ones considerably so beneath 
(in extreme specimens almost velvety to the touch) and the new twigs 
closely pubescent or at least puberulent. This is the common tree 
from southern Maine to Texas in the coastal region, and it is found 
inland more or less throughout the Atlantic States, in the Mississippi 
Basin and about the Great Lakes. In some parts of its range, how- 
ever, notably from the upland woods of western New England to the 
Carolina mountains, much of the Sassafras has the leaves nearly or 
quite glabrous from the first and the bark of the new shoots glabrous 
and often glaucous. 
This glabrous or glabrate Sassafras was well known to Thomas 
Nuttall who, in 1818, after setting off the deciduous-leaved laurels 
of the United States as a subgenus Kuosmus, described the smooth 
Sassafras as Laurus (Euosmus) albida or White Sassafras, which he 
distinguished from the commoner tree with pubescent twigs and 
foliage, his Laurus (Euosmus) Sassafras or Red Sassafras. Nuttall’s 
account of the two, under Laurus, was as follows: 
“The deciduous leaved species of the United States appear to con- 
stitute a subgenus, which I propose as follows: 
*Evosmus.j Flowers polygamous or dioicous.— Calix 6-parted. 
Nectarium none. Stamina 9, fertile; 6 exterior, naked, the 3 interior 
augmented by 6 infertile short stamina, attached by pairs; anthers 
of the sterile stamina glanduloid. Berry 1-seeded. 
Trees or shrubs with alternate deciduous leaves, entire or lobed; 
flowers appearing before the leaves in small conglomerate umbells, or 
conglomerate bracteate racemes in E. Sassafras and E. *albida . 
SI. Flowers umbellate, leaves entire. 
Species. 3. E.astivalis . . . . . 4. Benzoin, 
5. Diospyrus . . . . . 6. geniculata 
$U. Buds producing both leaves and flowers; racemes conglomerate, 
corymbose; leaves lobed. 
7. Sassafras. Dioicous; arborescent; buds, younger branches 
and the under side of the leaves pubescent; leaves entire, or 2 or 3 
z T From evooyos, odorous. *’ 
