ACERACEiE 



639 



from the ground into 3 or 4 stout upright secondary stems destitute of branches for 

 a considerable length, brittle pendulous branchlets light green and covered with len- 

 ticels when they first appear, soon becoming darker, bright chestnut-brown, smooth 

 and lustrous in the autumn and winter of their first year, and in their second season 

 pale rose color or gray faintly tinged with red. Winter-buds ^ iotig> with thick 

 ovate bright red outer scales rounded on the back, minutely apiculate, and ciliate on 

 the margins, and acute inner scales pubescent on the inner surface, becoming pale 

 green or yellow and about 1' long. Bark of young stems and large branches smooth 

 and gray faintly tinged with red, becoming on old trunks -^'-f ' thick, reddish brown 

 and more or less furrowed, the surface separating into large thin scales. Wood 

 hard, strong, close-grained, easily worked, rather brittle, pale brown, with thick 

 sap wood of 40-50 layers of annual growth; now sometimes used for flooring and in 

 the manufacture of furniture. Sugar is occasionally made from the sap of this tree. 



Distribution. Sandy banks of streams; valley of the St. John's River, New 

 Brunswick, to southern Ontario, southward to western Florida, and westward to 

 eastern Dakota and Nebraska, the valley of the Blue River, Kansas, and the Indian 

 Territory; rare in the immediate neighborhood of the Atlantic coast and on the high 

 Appalachian Mountains ; of its largest size on the banks of the lower Ohio and its 

 tributaries. 



Now often cultivated with several varieties in the eastern states, and in western 

 and northern Europe. 



12. Acer rubrum, L. Red Maple. Scarlet Maple. 



Leaves truncate, more or less cordate by a broad shallow sinus, rounded or wedge- 

 shaped at the base, 3-5-lobed by acute sinuses, with irregularly doubly serrate or 

 toothed lobes, the middle lobe often longer than the others, when they unfold pubes- 

 cent especially beneath, and at maturity light green and glabrous on the upper and 



white and more or less pubescent on the lower surface, particularly along the princi- 

 pal veins, chartaceous or sometimes almost coriaceous, l^'-6' long and rather longer 

 than broad, turning in the early autumn to brilliant shades of scarlet or scarlet and 

 orange; their petioles slender, 2'-4' long, red or green. Flowers opening in March 

 and April before the appearance of the leaves, bright scarlet or dull yellowish red, 



