1913] Fernald,— Nuttall’s White Sassafras 15 
lobed, under side prominently veined. (Red Sassafras.) — Anthers 
per es 4-celled. The female flower produces the 6 infertile stamina 
only. 
s *albida. Dioicous; arborescent; buds and younger branches 
smooth and glaucous; leaves entire, or 2 or 3 lobed, every where very 
smooth and thin, under side obsoletely veined, petiole longer. (White 
Sassafras.) Has. In North and South Carolina abundant, from 
the Catawba mountains to the east bank of the Santee; growing with 
the common species, which is in North Carolina less abundant. Ihave 
not seen it in flower, therefore the comparison is incomplete, but all 
the inhabitants distinguish them perfectly by the names of white and 
red Sassafras, this species is also sometimes denominated Smooth 
Sassafras; the root is much more strongly camphorated than the 
ordinary sort and nearly white; it is also better calculated to answer 
as a substitute for Ochra (Hibiscus esculentus) than E. Sassafras, 
its buds and young branches being much more mucilaginous.” ! 
Later, however, Nuttall concluded that the White Sassafras was a 
variety, rather than a species, saying in his North American Sylva: 
“SASSAFRAS (Laurus Sassafras. Linn). The inhabitants of 
North and South Carolina distinguish two kinds of Sassafras, the 
Red and the White. The Red or true L. Sassafras I referred (in the 
Genera of North American plants, vol. 1. p. 259, 260.) to a sub-genus 
Euosmus, embracing also the following variety, which I then con- 
sidered as a species, by the name of L. (Euosmus) albida....”? 
This mature judgment of Nuttall's appears sound for, although the 
two extremes are very pronounced, several specimens show transi- 
tions in the abundance and distribution of the pubescence; and the 
two varieties seem to be quite parallel with numerous other cases, 
such as the Red Ash, Fraxinus pennsylvanica Marsh. and Green Ash, 
F. pennsylvanica, var. lanceolata (Borkh.) Sargent or Ilex monticola 
Gray and its var. mollis (Gray) Britton. But, although the pubescent 
and the glabrous extremes of the Fraxinus and the Ilex have been 
long kept apart, sometimes as species, sometimes as varieties, the 
parallel case in Sassafras seems to have attracted little attention since 
the days of Nuttall and his immediate followers; for, though Sprengel 
went so far as to place the White Sassafras in a different genus from the 
Red (Tetranthera albida Spreng? based on “ Evosmus albida Nutt.”) 
and Nees^ maintained the two species, Sassafras officinale (Laurus 
1 Nutt. Gen. i. 258-260 (1818). 
? Nutt. Sylva, i. 88 (1842). 
3 Spreng. Syst. ii. 267 (1825). 
* Nees, Syst. Laur. 488-490 (1836). 
